I swear by desktops. For gaming, it is the way to go. I also have no real reason to be playing PC games when I'm not at home, so I don't need a laptop that can play games; I have an 6-year old laptop, and I use it for net surfing, typing/work, and watching stuff. Buying a gaming laptop can get crazy expensive, and they can also get pretty damn heavy too (a friend of mine had a 23 pound Alienware laptop).
Desktops are great because you don't have to buy a whole system. You can just replace certain parts as you need to. You can keep your hard disks, your drives, keyboard, mouse, monitor, and power supply for years. The only things that really need replacing are the cpu/mobo, ram, and video card.
And you can mix and match parts based on your budget. Nowadays you don't need a super-charged computer to play modern games in high-quality. Even a low-end cpu and video card will more than satisfy. My desktop has an old Nvidia 9600gt, a core 2 Duo E8400 processor, and 2 gigs of RAM and I'm just getting to the point where I can't max out everything on the newest games (Now I have to play in “high” quality instead of “ultra” or “super” or whatever). Seriously, an old hard drive will suit you if it's large enough, and drives are easy to come by. You could scrounge those from any old computer and use them. Then you buy yourself a cpu and Mobo (getting a combo is a good idea), a video card, and some RAM. If you don't mind putting it together yourself you can get yourself a pretty capable computer with just a few hundred dollars, and if you want to spend the money you could probably make yourself a benchmark killer for less than $1000
Desktops are great because you don't have to buy a whole system. You can just replace certain parts as you need to. You can keep your hard disks, your drives, keyboard, mouse, monitor, and power supply for years. The only things that really need replacing are the cpu/mobo, ram, and video card.
And you can mix and match parts based on your budget. Nowadays you don't need a super-charged computer to play modern games in high-quality. Even a low-end cpu and video card will more than satisfy. My desktop has an old Nvidia 9600gt, a core 2 Duo E8400 processor, and 2 gigs of RAM and I'm just getting to the point where I can't max out everything on the newest games (Now I have to play in “high” quality instead of “ultra” or “super” or whatever). Seriously, an old hard drive will suit you if it's large enough, and drives are easy to come by. You could scrounge those from any old computer and use them. Then you buy yourself a cpu and Mobo (getting a combo is a good idea), a video card, and some RAM. If you don't mind putting it together yourself you can get yourself a pretty capable computer with just a few hundred dollars, and if you want to spend the money you could probably make yourself a benchmark killer for less than $1000
