PC gaming và laptop gaming
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Gaming rigs arent one-size fits all. Some people love massive ATX towers with RGB lighting connected to a curved monitor and a mechanical keyboard. Others with less space may want a laptop that they can fold up and tuck away when theyre not using it. Show Portability of Gaming Desktops vs. LaptopsIn general, this is an easy win for gaming laptops. After all, even the mammoth 17-inch systems ultimately fold up and can fit in a bag. Now, if you make something small, like a mini ITX build, that may be portable enough for some to bring to a LAN party, especially if you have a car. But even that requires plenty of peripherals and a monitor to use. Winner: Laptop Upgradeability of Gaming Desktops vs. LaptopsOf course, what brings many to PC gaming is the ritual of building their own rig. You cant build a laptop on your own. But a desktop isnt as hard as it may seem to beginners. (See how to build a PC.) And when you build your own, you can customize it and upgrade it more in the future. Just want a better GPU? Faster RAM? Thats easy to add. And even if you want a new CPU that requires a different type of motherboard, you still have a case and power supply you can continue to use (and there will surely be a market for your used parts.) When everything is replaceable, desktops win upgradeability. Most laptops allow you to change out the RAM and storage, though some of the thinnest machines have the memory soldered to the motherboards. There are some improvements on the laptop front. For instance, the Alienware Area-51m has a replaceable desktop-class processor and a modular GPU, as we saw in our teardown. But thats a very sizable laptop, and its far more difficult to access those parts than in a desktop. Its also in the minority -- most laptops dont offer that level of customization. Winner: Desktop Cost of Gaming Desktops vs. LaptopsWhile its hard to directly compare gaming laptops and desktops due to the huge number of configurations as well as the price of components, just checking a few examples points to some general trends. For starters, we compared some close-to-entry level machines from Dells G series line.
In this case, the gaming desktop comes in $200 cheaper when both systems are outfitted with a 9th Gen Intel Core i5 CPU, GTX 1660 Ti (the laptop uses a Max-Q version) and 8GB of RAM (though the laptop gets dual-channel RAM while the desktop is stuck with single-channel). The desktop has twice the space of the laptop, albeit with a slower, clunkier spinning hard drive instead of a fast NVMe SSD. Pre-built desktops come with a bit of a labor cost built in. If you build it yourself, you can save some money and get better components. Heres one we put together on paper to see how we could do compared to that Dell G5: Custom Rig
Of course, prices fluctuate, and you could put more money into any given part. But here we had the same CPU and GPU, dual-channel, faster RAM, the same storage in an NVMe SSD and still had money for a nicer CPU cooler. If you want a laptop, there are plenty of deals out there, and laptops with Nvidias GeForce RTX 2060 are set to drop to $999 in the next few months. But in terms of computing and value, building a desktop is still king -- at least, before you buy peripherals. Performance of Gaming Desktops vs. LaptopsA lot about performance has to do with the specs you pick. If you buy a $3,000 gaming laptop, sure it will outperform an $800 gaming desktop. But all things being equal, a gaming desktop will be more powerful. Similar components will perform better on desktops. A bigger chassis and more fans allow for better cooling and heat dissipation, and lower temperatures mean stronger performance. Desktops also allow for liquid cooling, if you prefer. Winner: Desktop Bottom Line
A gaming desktop is still the most powerful, upgradeable, and, in some ways, affordable way to play games on a PC. You can use full-sized desktop components, swap out almost anything, and, if you build it, save some money. Either way, you can play games on a PC in a form factor you prefer, but theres a reason why people think of desktops first when they think of gaming PCs. Expand MORE:Best Gaming PCs MORE:Best Gaming Laptops Recent news{{ articleName }} |