Deciding between 2 pcs, a laptop or other

[Anjelllo]

Sorry if this is in the wrong section, couldn't decide which sub forum to put this in

So at the beginning of the summer i'm going to start having money come in from mowing lawns and general lawn care (my friend gave me an awesome deal on some expensive equipment he used to use) so i'm trying to decide what i'll be doing with that money. Right now i take my gaming laptop in my backpack from high school, to one of my parents house, then in the backpack, to high school, then my other parent's house( my parents are divorced and each parent gets me every other day). my current laptop is really not cutting it anymore, so I'm going to need an upgrade sometime soon. So i've been thinking, should i buy a new gaming laptop? or just build two pcs for each house? 

 

Reasons for building 2 pcs;

#1:Don't have to carry around a laptop in backpack (extra weight is not good for your back)

#2: wouldn't have to plug all my cables into a laptop every time i get home

#3: upgradability

#4: I already have a monitor, keyboard and mouse at both houses

 

Reasons for buying a gaming laptop;

#1: can take the laptop anywhere i want 

#2: the same files will be on the computer whether or not i'm at either house

#3 possibly cheaper if i can get a good deal on a laptop

 

also, does anyone know of a prebuilt gaming pc that's as thin as a laptop? that's my main constriction seeing as i have to fit whatever i buy in my backpack for school

 

Tl;dr: deciding between two gaming pcs or one laptop because i switch between two houses every day

 

Thanks!

[The Sloth]

 

[ChuckMaurice]

First of all, whatever you do keep the laptop as it will be useful for high school.

This is actually something I thought about doing, I chose your third solution : getting a desktop light/thin enough I could easily move. But I didn't went compact enough, and stop moving the rig. Maybe I can find back the research I did in 2013 on smaller cases than mine.

 

Two pcs seems like waste to me, that means two of everything, from buying every part twice to struggling to sync data between them.

A solution would be some thin gaming nettops like the ones here, but keep in mind that they are much closer to laptops than to a desktop build (though with the new Nvidia cards the difference is smaller)

 

Also Zotac models or Intel NUC Skull Canyon?

[SCHISCHKA]

there are small m-ITX cases like the node 202. Zotac has some prebuilt computers with the new mobile 10 series Nvidia cards that are very portable.

[ChuckMaurice]

Yeah, simplier with a playlist. Just ignore the first one and all AIO models.
Sidenote: How can I choose to just display the link for the Youtube playlist browser?

 

[Anjelllo]

2 minutes ago, SCHISCHKA said:

there are small m-ITX cases like the node 202. Zotac has some prebuilt computers with the new mobile 10 series Nvidia cards that are very portable.

thanks but i've looked into that and even the smallest pc cases are too thick for my backpack, not to mention the weight and the thought that if someone accidentally kicks my backpack the parts inside it might break

[Anjelllo]

2 minutes ago, jldjul said:

Yeah, simplier with a playlist. Just ignore the first one and all AIO models.
Sidenote: How can I choose to just display the link for the Youtube playlist browser?

 

also thanks, but those all look too thick for my backpack, except for the intel NUC which doesn't have a gpu....

[Anjelllo]

those gigabyte brix look promising, does anyone know of a micro pc with current gen hardware? gigabyte's site only shows them with max specs of a gtx 950

12 minutes ago, jldjul said:

 

 

Also Zotac models or Intel NUC Skull Canyon?

 

[ChuckMaurice]

6 minutes ago, Anjelllo said:

also thanks, but those all look too thick for my backpack, except for the intel NUC which doesn't have a gpu....

The Zotac Magnus is actually pretty thin and comes with a GTX 1060 or 1070. Price is pretty ok for what it's worth (900$ for 1060, you need SSD and RAM though)

 

https://www.amazon.com/ZOTAC-Barebones-dual-core-Bluetooth-ZBOX-EN970-U/dp/B01M27HA48?th=1

 

[Anjelllo]

5 minutes ago, jldjul said:

The Zotac Magnus is actually pretty thin and comes with a GTX 1060 or 1070. Price is pretty ok for what it's worth (900$ for 1060, you need SSD and RAM though)

 

https://www.amazon.com/ZOTAC-Barebones-dual-core-Bluetooth-ZBOX-EN970-U/dp/B01M27HA48?th=1

 

thanks! i think this is exactly what i need! 

[ChuckMaurice]

2 minutes ago, Anjelllo said:

thanks! i think this is exactly what i need! 

Enjoy portable gaming then