Advice on choosing between modest laptop and a desktop

[spidey20993]

Here is my case, I am currently doing a doctorate in Europe and in need of an upgrade computer wise, now I can either choose between a new laptop or a desktop, for a laptop I can't spend more than 1500€ since most available models at this budget are with a 4060, as for a desktop (screen included) I can push the budget up to 2000€ and between the two one has the advantage of portability and the other can be customized and upgraded over time, not to mention the performance difference, now what would you advice between what kind of PC I go with and if you have any good laptop suggestions or desktop builds within the budgets, that would be very helpful.

 

NB:  

 

* Location is Italy

* Primary usage of the upgrade is for research and gaming (the 2020 and forward single player releases)

* I already own an old laptop HP Probook i7 3rd gen which still works and will upgrade just its battery for light daily usages         

 

[Poinkachu]

17 minutes ago, spidey20993 said:

Here is my case, I am currently doing a doctorate in Europe and in need of an upgrade computer wise, now I can either choose between a new laptop or a desktop, for a laptop I can't spend more than 1500€ since most available models at this budget are with a 4060, as for a desktop (screen included) I can push the budget up to 2000€ and between the two one has the advantage of portability and the other can be customized and upgraded over time, not to mention the performance difference, now what would you advice between what kind of PC I go with and if you have any good laptop suggestions or desktop builds within the budgets, that would be very helpful.

 

NB:  

 

* Location is Italy

* Primary usage of the upgrade is for research and gaming (the 2020 and forward single player releases)

* I already own an old laptop HP Probook i7 3rd gen which still works and will upgrade just its battery for light daily usages         

 

If you need portability, then you should choose laptop.

As for gaming, 4060 should do fine as long you're okay with limited performance & graphical quality.

Example : I don't expect my 3060 laptop to be able to run AAA games on High/Ultra setting at 165fps, not even 120 depending on the game.

[PDifolco]

24 minutes ago, spidey20993 said:

Here is my case, I am currently doing a doctorate in Europe and in need of an upgrade computer wise, now I can either choose between a new laptop or a desktop, for a laptop I can't spend more than 1500€ since most available models at this budget are with a 4060, as for a desktop (screen included) I can push the budget up to 2000€ and between the two one has the advantage of portability and the other can be customized and upgraded over time, not to mention the performance difference, now what would you advice between what kind of PC I go with and if you have any good laptop suggestions or desktop builds within the budgets, that would be very helpful.

 

NB:  

 

* Location is Italy

* Primary usage of the upgrade is for research and gaming (the 2020 and forward single player releases)

* I already own an old laptop HP Probook i7 3rd gen which still works and will upgrade just its battery for light daily usages         

 

If you really have to commute with your PC you need a laptop

Else a desktop will perform much better and longer at similar price

If you can spare 2000EUR you could get both a good 1500ish gaming desktop and a cheapo 300EUR laptop to take notes in uni and such   

[spidey20993]

2 hours ago, Poinkachu said:

If you need portability, then you should choose laptop.

As for gaming, 4060 should do fine as long you're okay with limited performance & graphical quality.

Example : I don't expect my 3060 laptop to be able to run AAA games on High/Ultra setting at 165fps, not even 120 depending on the game.

Thanks for your insight, I'm pretty much comfortable with up to 60 fps medium/high quality, but even that, the market here is limited to mostly Lenovo's laptops, MSI, Dell and HP have a bad reputation for the targeted budget, the rest is expensive at the cost of low performance and almost no upgradability of anything, even storage. 

[spidey20993]

2 hours ago, PDifolco said:

If you really have to commute with your PC you need a laptop

Else a desktop will perform much better and longer at similar price

If you can spare 2000EUR you could get both a good 1500ish gaming desktop and a cheapo 300EUR laptop to take notes in uni and such   

Like I mentioned, I already have a Probook, so I'm either getting a new laptop or a desktop, having 3 devices will give me the hassle, do you have any suggestions for top performance build at 2k€? 

[PDifolco]

Just now, spidey20993 said:

Like I mentioned, I already have a Probook, so I'm either getting a new laptop or a desktop, having 3 devices will give me the hassle, do you have any suggestions for top performance build at 2k€? 

Si signor

SSD is a good one but kinda small due to budget constraint, you can always add a big cheap one later for additional storage

 

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D 4.2 GHz 8-Core Processor  (€374.99 @ Amazon Italia) 
CPU Cooler: Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 SE 66.17 CFM CPU Cooler  (€38.90 @ Amazon Italia) 
Motherboard: Gigabyte B650 GAMING X AX ATX AM5 Motherboard  (€193.44 @ Amazon Italia) 
Memory: G.Skill Trident Z 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5-6000 CL30 Memory  (€139.00 @ Amazon Italia) 
Storage: Solidigm P41 Plus 1 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive  (€63.00 @ Amazon Italia) 
Video Card: PNY VERTO OC GeForce RTX 4070 Ti SUPER 16 GB Video Card  (€911.10 @ Amazon Italia) 
Case: Phanteks Eclipse G360A ATX Mid Tower Case  (€104.99 @ Amazon Italia) 
Power Supply: Thermaltake Toughpower GF3 TT Premium 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply  (€129.33 @ Amazon Italia) 
Total: €1954.75
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Generated by PCPartPicker 2024-03-17 14:10 CET+0100

 

[Poinkachu]

2 hours ago, spidey20993 said:

Thanks for your insight, I'm pretty much comfortable with up to 60 fps medium/high quality, but even that, the market here is limited to mostly Lenovo's laptops, MSI, Dell and HP have a bad reputation for the targeted budget, the rest is expensive at the cost of low performance and almost no upgradability of anything, even storage. 

Dunno which Lenovo you meant.
Legion series should be fine, I'm using Legion 5, 2022's edition.

LOQ series probably a rename of formerly Ideapad Gaming, which IIRC a budget gaming laptop series.

No idea about current Lenovo gaming series, but up to my Legion, the BIOS is pretty much locked bios, so if you are into overclocking or stuffs it gonna suck.

 

You can watch Jarrod's Tech for quite a detailed laptop review. Not for all laptops in the world though, that's not feasible to do.

But should give you a gist of the build quality, thermal, and performance. At the very least for other variants in the same series.

https://www.youtube.com/@JarrodsTech