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Gaming PC : Gaming Laptop vs Gaming Desktop, what to buy?

Gaming Laptop vs Gaming Desktop

Gaming is seeing a rise in popularity in India, more and more people are buying the gaming focused desktops and laptops. Majority of Indians already own some sort of PC(either desktop or laptop), but they're not gaming grade hardware, so when they decided to get into gaming, they either had to settle with low requirement games or get a new PC. But when it comes to buying a new PC, most people(including gamers) are not that tech savvy. If you are rich, you don't have to do much research, you can simply just grab the highest end hardware that's available at the time of purchase and start gaming. Problem is, not everyone is that rich, so the budget gamers have to do some research, ask the most tech savvy person for help or watch youtubers. And when you ask around, everyone will tell you that desktops give more performance than a laptop, which is true but there's a catch. 

When people say "desktops will give better performance than laptops at the same price", they often overlook one major fact: a laptop is a complete PC. You don't have to buy anything else at all(except for mouse, seriously, who plays games with touchpad). When people will recommend you a desktop, they'll often give you the specs for the tower only, they'll not include the peripherals in the budget. So the buyer either have to settle for a laptop or extend the budget and get a desktop. So I'll try to list all the pros and cons of both type of systems so that you can decide yourself.

Pros and Cons of a Gaming Laptop

Portability - It's obvious since laptops are meant to portable devices. So you can carry it to your office or college for official works.

Battery - Even if you only use it in your house, if there's an unfortunate power cut, you can still continue your game for at least an hour so you can properly end your online gaming session. 

Requires relatively less amount of research - There aren't many variables in laptop shopping, once you figure out the required horsepower, all you have to do is pick between brands. 

Lack of upgradability - At most you can upgrade is your RAM and Storage. So you have to carefully pick a future proof laptop, which means spending a bit more than minimum. 

Smaller Screen - The biggest screen size you'll get is 17.3 inches. It's alright for some people but some games are more immersive at bigger screen. Technically you can connect it to an external monitor but if you are buying a monitor, why not get a desktop instead? Monitor is the most expensive peripheral after-all. 

Pros and Cons of a Gaming Desktop

Upgradability - Unless you're buying a weirdly designed pre-build(yes I'm talking about you Alienware), you can swap out any component for a better one at any time. So you don't have to buy an entire new system if it feels outdated. 

More powerful than Laptops - All the laptop components have to fit inside a small body. So to avoid overheating, processing capabilities of mobile components are suppressed. So usually laptop components perform a tier below of their desktop counterparts. As a result, a laptop RTX 2060 is often beaten by a desktop GTX 1660 Ti.

Better customization - In laptops, you either get a certain feature or you don't. Also you have to pick from something that manufactures are offering. But you can choose any combination of hardware that you want. For example, you can pair a GT 710 with Ryzen 9 5950X(you CAN but DON'T) if you want to.

Requires a lot of research - If you are building a custom PC on your own, you have to make sure that everything is compatible with each other. So if you're not a tech enthusiast, this can take weeks or even months. That's the reason those ridiculously overpriced pre-builds are still a thing. 

Hidden expenses - There are few hidden expenses that generally nobody addresses. These are

  • Windows cost - Laptops come with Windows pre-installed with some sort of license. If you are building a PC on your own, you will need to buy the license. 
  • Power backup - Some places(specially in India) don't have 24x7 electricity. If you are living in such locality then you probably end up buying a UPS or inverter. These can mess up your budget entirely. 

 So should you buy a Gaming Laptop or Gaming Desktop?

Well this still depends a lot on the requirement of portability. If your job/lifestyle needs you to be moving/traveling a lot then you should definitely buy a laptop. But if portability is not a factor then I'll strongly suggest that you should get a desktop. Because a ₹50,000 Gaming desktop plus peripherals is still better than a ₹50,000-60,000 Gaming laptop.

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