The Great PVC Laptop Debate

Discussion in 'Gaming' started by Alpolio, Jul 11, 2020.

  1. A new gen is just a few months away and that means that it's time to choose sides. And long time PVC members remember that I've always sided with the underdog. Not because it was stupid but because it was smart. In the early years, I was about the GameCube. Metroid Prime was the best looking FPS of that generation and it still holds up today.



    During the start of the following gen, I tried going with the 360, but the RROD killed that excitement. And I quickly moved to Sony's camp. It was that gen's underdog and as such: it was obviously the best of the bunch. Best gameplay, best graphics, best everything and no RROD. Killzone 2 was my favorite FPS from that generation too. It topped everything the 360 had to offer.



    And this past generation, I picked the Xbox One. It wasn't just an underdog. People actually hated it. I came close to picking the Wii U, but there was more hate on the Xbones side, so M$ won. And, as usual, it paid off in spades! The XBX is the most powerful console on the planet. Just look at what Red Dead Redemption 2 looks like running on real hardware!



    Today it's time to pick a new winner for my rampant trolling. And after careful consideration, I've picked the... (insert drum roll please) ... The PlayStation 5! Yep. Sony's got that underdog feeling this time around. Just listen to the news from a PS5 fanboy...



    Microsoft is buying up everything thus leaving Sony in 3rd place. But it won't matter... you know... because of Minecraft. So I'm backing Sony. Just like that idiot.
     
  2. Mmmm I dunno. I think you failed by skipping the Wii U. It still has haters but it was a good system.
     
  3. Most games are multiplatform these days. May as well just get a PC. The consoles have basically become closed system PCs running AMD hardware. Even the "exclusive" games like Halo and Horizon Zero Dawn now come out on PC eventually. I can't even think of any games off the top of my head that I missed this last gen by going PC only. You could even play WiiU/Switch stuff like Zelda Breath of the Wild using emulators. But I guess PC wouldn't be your choice if you want an underdog. PC is the king of gaming platforms.
     
  4. I do have a Switch, which is the #1 seller right now. I have always owned a handheld system. And since Sony took their Vita and went home mad, Nintendo wins that category by default.

    I suppose that I could drop all support for the new gen and back Nintendo Switch whole heartily. Like cmdrmonkey said, most console games are getting PC ports with Switch being forced into emulation. And you can't really play a PC in the truck on lunch break or in the toilet at the house. You can, but I had one of those laptops -- it's just a desktop with a foldable screen that gets an hour on a charge. So owning a real Switch is a must buy for portability alone.
     
  5. Ever play Luigi's Mansion 3? I'm considering getting it. I remember seeing the original on the GameCube and thinking it looked pretty good.
     
  6. I want Luigi's Mansion 3 very badly, but I've been holding out for a sale. Luigi's Mansion was my first GameCube game, so this is a must have for me. I think that I'm going to cave in and get it anyway, because it'll never go on sale.
     
  7. Agreed. I've never seen it on sale and probably never will.
     
  8. I enjoyed Luigi's Mansion 3, played it through on 2 player with the child.

    Probably not as good as the original but a good game none the less.
     
  9. You should apply this logic to everything you do in life, maybe even become a life coach and help people turn their life around with the 'pick the underdog' plan.

    Instead of buying a house in a nice neighbourhood, buy one in the biggest shit hole you can find because, that area deserves a chance too right? Only eat at restaurants you don't like from now on, only go to the dentist with the worst reviews on Google.

    Underdogs FTW.
     
  10. It's a pretty easy decision if you have a gaming PC and like VR. PC is my main gaming machine and Pro had a lot of nice first party and VR software I couldn't find elsewhere. Probably sticking with PC as my main gaming platform and PS5 as secondary platform for first party and VR software again next gen.
     


  11. Well, that kind of f**** my plans. Oh well, Xbox Series X it is then.

    But I'm keeping the Switch.
     
  12. #12 cmdrmonkey, Sep 21, 2020
    Last edited: Mar 19, 2022
    Their stuff will still come out on PC since it's a Microsoft platform.

    Bethesda's quality has gone to shit in recent years. Fallout 76 was a dumpster fire. The Wolfenstein games have gotten bad. The Elder Scrolls series has been essentially dormant since Skyrim almost a decade ago. I'm hoping MS whips them into shape.
     
  13. I was tempted to try gaming on a laptop. But that was before the studio that's making this...



    ... became a Microsoft property. That game went from a PS5 exclusive to a timed exclusive (my guess is 30 days) before I ate lunch today. Microsoft's 1st party studio lineup is now a juggernaut that can't be ignored.
     
  14. Who games on a laptop? Build a desktop like a normal human.
     
  15. I can actually support the purchase of gaming laptops now! Only if you have disposable income though. Sounds like something you could say in the past, but I wouldn't have recommended a gaming laptop for anyone back in the day even if they had disposable income.

    The build quality of specific models now are excellent and they'd last you years. They actually spend time to build them with proper heat dissipation and not sound like jet engines when you game.

    So if you don't have proper computer hardware knowledge and want to game on pc and still keep it mobile and have money to burn, go balls out.

    I got a Lenovo Legion y740 last year in April for $1400.

    15.6" 1080p dolbyvision hdr 144hz gsync display
    i7-8750H cpu + 16GB ram
    256GB nvme drive + 1GB 7200rpm hdd
    geforce 2070 max-q gpu

    It's about 5lbs so a huge improvement from back in the day
     
  16. They’re better. That being said I’d still recommend most people build a gaming desktop and get something like a MacBook Air or a Thinkpad X1 Carbon for their notebook.
     
  17. It's the knowledge part that one normally has to consider. Building a gaming desktop requires knowledge and patience. Does the person you're talking to know how to shop for the parts? Will they know how to put it together?

    I literally have no patience anymore. I own all sorts of apple shit just because it all works and the UI is the same all the time so I don't have to relearn shit all the time.

    When something dies on my computer, I just say fuck it. I wait like a week or two to even deal with it.

    Building a computer isn't a fun anymore. It's a time sink that I don't care for anymore.

    I don't look forward to building a new computer. I have to do all this reading and shit.

    I don't know where to find gourmet caramel apples in North Carolina.
     
  18. Well that is some terrible advice, the Macbook air has some of the worst cooling on the planet and should never be recommended, not while they are still using x86. The heatsink and fan are not even connected and have a large space between them. You leave so much performance on the table to throttling.

    I suspect they have been designing the air chassis for 10nm and beyond Intel chips that never came but still, putting in a hot chip so that you can still sell the thing instead of redesign is a really dodgy practice even by Apple standards.

    ARM chips might make this chassis work better but only time will tell.
     
  19. #19 cmdrmonkey, Sep 22, 2020
    Last edited: Sep 22, 2020
    So much butthurt over the MacBook Air. It’s great for what most people do with notebooks. Louis Rossman who is a whiny crybaby is the only person I see complaining about the cooling. And I’d still recommend it over just about any Windows notebook other than the X1 Carbon and a few other Thinkpads. Most Windows notebooks are trash with poor build quality. Specs hardly matter with laptops beyond a certain point. It’s all about build quality and ruggedness because they get used and abused and thrown around in a way that desktops don’t. MacBooks and Thinkpads generally have good build quality.

    Building a desktop is a test. If you pass you get to join the Master Race. If you fail you stay in the slums with the console riff raff.
     
  20. #20 Grim, Sep 22, 2020
    Last edited: Sep 22, 2020
    It's a badly crippled device that is priced at a point where you should get so much more power for your money.

    If you really want to buy Apple don't buy an air because you're paying for performance it just can't provide, go with a pro which at least can use most of the horsepower it has. Soldered SSDs are also a shit move no matter how you look at it, the amount of dead HDDs and SSDs people bring to me at work to try and get data off of, no chance once soldered. At least with a drive I can let Linux go through each block overnight and usually get a chunk of data back as long as the drive has power, even if some of it is damaged, something is better than nothing.

    Apple are just creating e-waste with the air but when they change to ARM then it might change as they will have a much lower TDP. Anyone who buys an air or recommends anyone buys an air is an idiot who had money to burn. Its a chassis designed for a chip that isn't yet on sale.

    The Dell XPS 13 is probably the best notebook on the market right now. I'd recommend something with a Ryzen CPU if AMD hadn't fucked up its laptop supply chain so nothing to recommend.

    Building PCs is not an elite club anymore, it's a piece of piss. When I started in the mid 90s there was a lot more to it, now it's all the same stuff and there is no real skill involved even with overclocking.