Gaming laptop or just a basic laptop?

#1

I’m going to be attending college pretty soon so I was picking at my options:

  • getting a cheap $300-400 laptop for minor programs like word and just save up later for a gaming desktop that I can build/customize after I finish.
    or
  • purchasing a $700-1000 gaming laptop that can run most games on mid-high quality without frame rate issues.

Technically, I feel the gaming laptop might get burnt out (and have issues arise like all laptops do) after the first two years or so, but I’d rather not have a bulky desktop in my dorm plus a minor laptop.

It’s all a matter of convenience for me, I’ve heard you can even buy pretty decent gaming desktop towers at wal-mart now for around $500. If that’s true, it may be plausible for me to just build my own desktop and purchase a cheap laptop for my word processing needs, right?

If it is possible for me to build my own desktop, I would love to get feedback on what would be the most cost effecient in budget vs performance. You guys all seem to know your stuff.

#2

bring along your desktop for gaming, the risk of overheating and general over-priced hardware isn’t worth it for a gaming laptop

#3

I have a gaming laptop from MSI as an extension to my desktop, and it has no overheating issues.

#4

It’ll only overheat due to faults of your own, I’ve been gaming on my laptop for almost 3 years and it’s only once been a problem, and that was when the entire fan unit and heat sink was just covered in dust bunnies, took it apart and cleaned it out and the temperatures dropped on average about 35C lower.

Just ensure proper ventilation (don’t game whilst on your bed, just asking for it then) and you’ll be fine.

#5

or if it’s a badly designed laptop

seriously, some gaming laptops only have one fan

#6

or if it’s a badly designed laptop[/quote]
True that, in my experience HP are very bad for that, every single HP laptop I have used from mate’s etc have all had bad overheating problems.