Will you continue to game on a notebook?

For your next purchase; do you see yourself sticking with notebook gaming? Or will you go to desktop for more power at a lower price?

 

I am into notebook gaming forever.
Probably might settle down with Desktop when I will have a permanent address with a permanent job
Anyway, for now, Im waiting for R3.

 

Always. Notebooks are so much cleaner on the desk space. Besides, I'm too used to moving around the house to be forced to sit in a single place and play.

 

Desktop hardware ages ahead of most % of the games requirements and gaming notebooks same level as mid gaming desktops ...

I just stick for gaming notebook mid end desktop nettops and netbooks no1 say that you can only have 1 4 pc looks nice on my desk and I can either take my netbook to work or take notebook to work with

 

When I was buying my first notebook I was like - I will never, ever, and not even then use desktop computer for anything.

Now I'm on my fourth notebook, I use it mostly for work and I'm quite sure I'll buy myself one nice fancy desktop PC for gaming

 

Honestly I can't see myself upgrading for 5-6 years (outside of buying a new HDD/RAM.) I might get a desktop in 6 years, but I feel that with nanowire batteries and low power consumption/high performance mobile CPU/GPUs I really won't have to.

I think portability will be just as important to me in 6 years and portable computers will have evolved to be pretty damn close to their desktop equivalents.

 

notebook till I'm out of university, don't really have a choice.

 

Probably. My current desktop rig can score about 16000 3DMark06. My current laptop over 10000. I'll have to run 3DMark Vantage too because I don't recall what it is.

My next laptop, Sandy Bridge i7-2720QM, HD 6870, 6GB DDR3, maybe G3 Intel SSD, should be close to my desktop which can play pretty much everything maxed out at 1920x1200.

Beginning of next year, I have to decide between a desktop complete upgrade or laptop. I'm very likely choosing laptop. I figure if I can spare a couple hundred bucks extra I can throw a GTX 470 in my desktop to give it another year or so before going with a desktop Ivy Bridge in 2012 sometime.

Mainly because my needs have changed. I used to have my "man cave" in my finished basement with my desktop rig, big screen TV, etc. Then I had kids, and now that "man cave" turned into "kids haven" and rarely use it for gaming anymore. A laptop in my bedroom will get more use.

 

I absolutely love notebook gaming, built desktops for years, but once I got my first halfway decent laptop, I've been hooked ever since.

I love the portability, and for ~$1000 you can get a great notebook that will play anything just fine where ever you happen to be.

 

Nick & Laptop 4 ever.

I travel and such and I like portability and power.

 

+ for that, it is something like notebooks forever for me.. I must be able to move my computer from one place to another place very easily.

 

I really like laptops and i dont see a desktop in my near future.Im gonna run it till she dies.I will stick to laptops for gaming,im so used to it,it would be to hard to go back to a desktop.

 

Heh I just bought meself a desktop last month. I got tired of watching my laptop burn at 92C every time I played Borderlands. Also, performance in F1 2010 and other recent games was lacking.

Of course, I still value the portability of a laptop, so mine's going to stay with me a while.

 

notebook for me. I want to play game without consuming so much power. Well it also depends on the notebook. So i'll go for those single GPU gaming notebooks.

 

desktop, but thats not going to be for another 5+ years so...

 

Depends on if game requirements leap way ahead the next time I look to upgrade (~3 yrs). If we still have the ps3 and 360 as frontline consoles, then laptops will be more than powerful enough to handle 99% of titles. They already are...

 

i'm likely staying in laptop i'm also gonna wait until the next gens of consoles are out until i think about upgrading my laptop so i don,t screwed over tech changing soon just making games incompatible

 

I haven't tried metro 2033 which supposedly runs slow even with the best laptop GPUs, but every game i've tried runs great on my laptop at 1920x1080, all detail settings maxed.

no need to run games on my desktops which are more for work related stuff

 

Bare in mind that the issue you describe is more related to the quality of the laptop chassis and cooling design.

I can play any game for hours, including Borderlands and never go beyond 72C on all Cores of my CPU, with my GPU never going beyond 78C. However, I once owned a laptop that had a GPU half as powerful than my current one, yet it idled 20C higher and maxed out in the 90's.

 

currently I own a an np 8690 but as soon as games become more demanding than bc2 or crysis i'm defintely purchasing a desktop. but i'd love to see desktops become smaller in size? maybe then the line between a laptop and desktop will become unnoticeable.

 

Ive been building custom gaming riggs for myself and others for over 4 years and have been to many lans. Didnt occur to me how much a gaming laptop would elimate any inconveniences until recently
Decided to sell my rigg, buy a laptop and save up for a car and i have had no regrets so far

 

Desktop at home, Notebook outside the country.

 

Notebook gaming will probably be too expensive for me.. I don't plan on buying another gaming laptop, but I guess time will tell me.Who knows where I'll be in 3 years. However I like the extra power a desktop can provide you for the same price, which is why I'll probably build my own gaming rig when my Alienware becomes too weak.

 

High end notebook for gaming all round, and a ps3 with a big display for home entertaiment, but of course that's just dreaming atm

 

Laptop sales continue to increase and laptop components continue to get better and prices decreasing. 2 years ago buying a top end machine with equivalent hardware like HD5870M and i7 720QM for $1,500 would have been unheard of. These would have been Clevos almost $3,000.

I see no reason why my next machine wouldn't be a laptop again.

And Game Developers now know how prevalent mobile gaming is. They can no longer just make a game that requires a desktop GPU. This is no longer an option for them. The cost of development cannot be exceeded in sales if they only target desktop gamers. I don't think Games will ever return to that. Games will be able to run on high detail on Laptops and Consoles for the foreseeable future.

Even for workstation work... I think I read there is an increase in the use of high performance workstation laptops now.

 

^^ well said.
I think for me it really depends on several things. Mainly I'll be spliting a house with some friends/roommates so having a laptop I can play anywhere is great, but I expect there will be lots of gathering in the common room around a console playing Halo or COD split screen.

I don't like the direction all the consoles are going with there motion controls, so even through consoles are multiplayer on the same couch there obession with making me jump around like an idea may drive me to stay on a laptop.

One of my favorite things about laptops is once I've bought it, thats pretty much it for upgrades. I never open mine up despite having worked on hundreds of computers. When I have a desktop its never finished and always one pay check away from more ram, or a new video card, regardless of if I need it.

 

I used to be a desktop only person untill i purchased a laptop 6months ago because i needed the mobility.
Boy was i in for a supprice!!!!
This laptop has beaten all my expertasions and now after almost 6months i cannot be more happier with it!!!
Even tho the close future will have less gaming for me ( creating a family etc ) i will keep at my laptop in any case.
Besides, even tho its a little bit more expensive, the laptops are also upgradable now withs means longer duration

The only drawback is that i cannot install a second hdd without getting rid of my optical drive... and i do not like to drag external drives with me.
Well, guess i have to wait untill they present the 1tb 7200rpm for laptops. there is a 1tb but only 5400...

 

Mmm thats a toughy, im hoping to get maybe 3 years of good solid gaming in this laptop before tessellation destroys my gpu and I have to upgrade. At that point the g73 will still be good enough to keep around so maybe ill get a desktop to get the best of the best. But this is all also dependent on what kind of market there will be for pc games in 3 years time. Who knows what will shake up the vgame industry by then.

 

I hope by then Tessellation will be a forgotten dream of a crying Nvidia head of development.

I hope 3D Graphics by them move to something like voxel and ray tracing. Leaving behind the days of beefy GPUs behind for something more efficient.

 

I do both notebook and desktop, as well as console and portable too. Why limit myself?

 

I used to do the same until I found I got more enjoyment from my gaming laptop than my Xbox 360, so now that is packed up ready to be sold once I get round to sorting out the advert details. I used to play Nintendo DS and GBA but found myself using emulators for those systems on my laptop instead.

So now when traveling, instead of taking my DS, GBA, GBC and PDA, I just have my laptop now.

I like being able to do everything on one machine. For example, I might be watching a movie in bed, playing a game on the couch or another room, surfing the internet, using messenger and playing games at a different location if I chose.

 

Id never buy a desktop

Its actually more expensive and its performance is starting to be almost nothing.
Eventually they will stop really selling parts for them, ie your desktop will use laptop gpus. Its happening already. The hard drive format will become 2.5 inch exclusively shortly.

A desktop is sort of about as useful as a playstation to me. Something exclusively stuck to ac at home for playing games.

 

Amen to that.

I will never build another desktop.

A year from now Mobility 7000 will cross a performance line, which completely validates notebook gaming.

 

I don't see this as an either/or situation. To me desktop and laptop gaming together are what separates PC gaming from consoles. With my desktop I have the option of running games showing console gamers what true 1080p gaming should look like. Also with the rise of digital distribution services such as Steam and great features like Steam Cloud I can take my games with me without skipping a beat on my laptop.

Not to mention even when my laptop is unable to play the latest benchmark games I'll still have an enormous catalog of games to enjoy and with the rise of browser based games there will likely still be new games for me to enjoy.

 

Well right now I have L4D as my main game on my desktop, AC Brotherhood on my PS3, Tomb Raider Anniv on my notebook and just kind of rotate stuff on my PSP or DS. I also have a Wii which will see DKC, Epic Mickey and Goldeneye sometime after Xmas but isn't really getting used much right now.

I really enjoy building PCs and am gathering parts for my next build right now. My laptop is starting to show its age in gaming and replacing it will likely cost 2x (or more) as much as my new desktop. So I consider laptop gaming as my mobile or couch PC gaming solution.

I am comfy with this and it works well for me. Maybe a bit overboard in the toy arena but s'ok, I am not letting anything else suffer for it. I actually have a baby on the way so who knows what my gaming will be like in 5 months. ;-)

 

I haven't gamed on a desktop in 10 years (yup, I'm serious).

Always ....always, a laptop. The portability is just too valuable.

I also like to game on the couch while watching TV

 

ive been gaming since the 1980's. ive gone from an atari 400, a commodore64, a 286, 386, 486, pentium 3, p IV, and c2d desktop.
there was a time when you had to have the newest gpu to run the newest games on a pc. but thanks to the consoles, thats not the case anymore.
i just cant see myself going back to a desktop. to me gaming alone on a desktop in dark room is just too juvenile. to me it also seems like an inevitable footnote in computing history.
laptops and portable gaming imho is the last bastion of pc gaming. its one thing the consoles cannot do. i can game in starbucks, i can game while on a holiday, on a train, a plane etc.
the only thing for portable gaming to really break out is a wee bit lower prices for gaming laptops.

 

I can never go back to desktop stuff. I work from home and It's being able to sit on the couch next to my wife while she nerds out on her laptop and do my work, chat with friends and watch tv.

I've been hooked on using a laptop for gaming and such for a few years now and I just cannot see going back to a full sized desktop.

Although my current machine isn't what I would call super portable, it's easy enough to take it upstairs or into the kitchen if I want.

 

Desktop or Laptop?

Its like having two fine women why would you only want to be with one of them?

My laptop she is kinky and gets down to business with me anywhere I want on the go.

But its nice to come how to my tried and true desktop she is always there for me and is dependable and can get a lot of work done.

My laptop is slim and lightweight, I like how she always is dressed in black and makes other guys jealous when they see her in public.

My desktop is a bit bigger she has 3 monitors but thats ok its more to love. People may think that 3 monitors is kinda tipping the scales on the side of overboard but when your actually using 3 monitors you never complain about it.

Ah yes, having 2 computers a laptop and a desktop is truly the best.

 

I can't decide anymore what to buy. I realised that whenever I want something, and I finally get it (like the 200€ gpu for my laptop in september), I want something else after a few weeks (got my eye on a ps3+FXIII, while my laptop gpu was actually bought for the purpose that I wouln't need to buy any console).

If I would live alone, i'd probably go with a powerfull desktop + console, but since I still live at home, I like the ability to take my stuff to quiet places and game/work without being disturbed by relatives.

So eventhough a 1000€ gaming desktop would probably be the best and most cost efficiënt choice for me, i'll probably go with a +-1500€ Alienware or Asus G laptop with my next purchase, accompagnied with some cheap ultraportable for <500€ for my studies.

 

I was a serious desktop gamer. I always had the latest GPU's + Parts (8800GTX, 4870x2 etc) then I switched to my M15x. Realized that a 5850M is no way in hell comparable to a 5850 Desktop Part. As well as the CPU. When I join the Navy and get settled down I will def get a DESKTOP for gaming. Its just cheaper (Price/Performance is far better) and easier to upgrade overall.

 

ok I got a p8700 cpu , 500 gb hd 260 gtx and a 17 inch lcd screen for 400$

build me that desktop.

 

That's used / refurbed, and still priced a little low. Refurb with the 320GB at BB is $489.99. With new retail pricing a laptop will always be more expensive than a desktop with same / similar specs.

 

Notebook gaming is FTW. (I have played only 3 months on it, but still loving it!)

 

my buddy got a AMD x3 cpu and crossfire 4870's with 500gb hdd, though no screen, for $280.

i would say desktop at home and notebook while traveling. when i'm at home, i want to sit comfortably at my desk. i can't stand slouching over on a couch to play an fps or any game, rather. i need a mouse pad, a mouse, and a power supply hooked up, so i'm limited to where there are outlets, and i don't like having wires dangling all over the rooms.

i wanted my notebook to last 5 years, but since games get more demanding, the gpu's i had, even in SLI, were losing performance quickly due to newer shading techniques not being supported by the cards. if manufacturers ever standardize MXM cards (like they're supposed to), notebook gaming would be much more viable.

since i'm nearing the end of my college degree and spending money out the ying-yang, i don't have money to spend on a notebook every time the gpu's can't handle gaming well anymore, and after being able to game on max/high settings, i don't want to look at something on low/medium settings since i've been spoiled.

the only reason why i like desktops better is because the upgradability and performance of desktops are still much higher than notebooks. when it's time to upgrade the GPU's on your notebook, it seems the majority of the time you have to spend ~$1500 so you can get a new laptop, rather than ~250 for a new GPU.

the freedom of being portable is nice, but i never game while moving, nor in awkward positions, so i mostly have my notebook now for school / programming work, and occassional gaming. to me a DTR is not viable as a "portable" gaming device. it works just as a lightweight desktop. it's movable, but who sits with a 17 inch gaming notebook in their lap on the couch? how is that comfortable for your neck

 

no kidding.
when you buy one at full retail and buy another from components its makes you think you are getting a better deal.

If youre buying your notebooks at full retail youre not paying attention.

Desktops are more expensive. Its a loooong since outdated concept that they are cheaper. Or money spent more intelligently.

Find a way. By the time you can find a cpu, and a gpu card and a hd youre past 400 on deep sale items and you dont even have a screen.

 

i built a desktop for my friend for 373 that scores 12000 on 3dmark06 (didn't test vantage). keyboard was 20 bucks, he already had a mouse and he had a screen. if you factor in a nice screen you're at ~600, and that is, you're buying a ~230 dollar screen. there are decent screens for under $200. so no, a notebook will not cost less. my whole setup was 900 bucks and i score 12k in vantage, 17k in 3dmark06, and max out pretty much every game i play.

you can get a 1tb hdd for less than 60 bucks, the 460gtxOC gpu is now selling for less than 200 bucks, and there are multiple CPU's you can get that perform extremely well for under 200. granted, these combinations of components will outperform most notebooks costing ~$2000. so you're buying the same performance for ~1/3 the cost.

 

I'm all about the combo of a powerful gaming desktop with a portable gaming laptop. I currently have a Acer 4820TG, and it plays all the games I want just fine, and yet it remains portable at around 5 lbs and 7 hours of battery life. )

 

I won't even go there. I've been building desktops for well over 20 years. Desktops are cheaper, or better put, more performance for your dollar. Yes you can always say "no monitor" but a monitor can last you ten years. Mine's going on five and still working beautifully. Divide your total investment over ten years it's a minor cost. With a laptop you have to buy a screen every time.

Give me $1000 for your best performance in a desktop or laptop, desktop will be roughly twice the performance for the same price. I can configure a desktop for <$350 with more performance than your laptop, no monitor, without looking hard, just configure it at newegg, and know I can drop maybe 10% off that total price with a little digging. I can update the CPU and GPU in a year or so, where you'll have to replace your entire laptop to be able to play that "new game" with the same performance as the upgraded desktop.

You also have to look at the total cost of ownership over time. For gaming, you pretty much need to upgrade at least two of your significant components every 18-24 months (GPU, CPU, Memory, hard drive / ssd, motherboard). My current gaming desktop I can't really say what it cost initially because it's always evolving. Over the course of the last five to six years, my average cost each year is probably only about $250. For a gaming laptop, in most cases, you'd have to buy a new laptop.

I have both a desktop and laptop for gaming. Laptop is mainly for convenience for me. But given the chance, I'll hop onto my desktop for a game.

 

That's not even factoring in that a laptop will generally only come with an year's worth of warranty standard while a desktop's components will often have multi-year warranties. Some companies like XFX will even offer lifetime warranties for their GPUs.

You would be correct if you said that the sunk cost of a desktop is higher because you would need to purchase peripherals like speakers, keyboard, monitor, OS, etc. However all of those peripherals can last past your desktop's lifetime, you would be hard pressed to transfer your laptop LCD and such to your next laptop.