Do you do your simming on a laptop?

If so, you are in a tiny minority!

Although good, grunty gaming laptops are now affordable and hugely popular with players of FPS and racing titles, it seems they are very much out of favour with simmers.

Which gaming rig do you spend most time per week using Only one choice allowed (102 total votes) Desktop PC 83 (81%) Laptop PC 8 (8%) iDevice 2 (2%) Android device 1 (1%) Console 8 (8%)

(Source, SimHQ)

I am one of the few. I use an ASUS G750JW. 17.3" screen, i7-4700HQ CPU, 8GB RAM, 2GB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 765M, 750GB hybrid SSD/HD drive, it cost me around 1600 USD here in Denmark, EU. The same money, for a purpose built gaming rig from the same supplier would have got me no screen, an i5 4440 CPU, 8GB RAM, GTX 770 2GB, and a 120GB SSD. Pretty much a wash, assuming you already have a good screen.

(If those prices seem high, welcome to Scandinavia...most of that is taxes...)

I go for a portable, because I travel a lot for work, sometimes for weeks at a time, and so I can throw my 4kg rig into my hand baggage (it doubles as my work PC), put the power brick and a joystick into my suitcase, and I am covered.

With my Kindle or iPad mini, some papers, Bose headphones and a packet of mints, I get in just under the hand baggage allowance and don't have to watch hotel cable TV on those (few) nights I am not in a bar or steakhouse with colleagues.

I guess the reason most people are not like me, is the sheer weight of peripherals that can become 'essential' for dedicated simmers, and the fact other people leave their hobby in their mancave, where it belongs. I would blow my baggage allowance totally if I tried to bring pedals, throttle, TrackIR etc etc 

Good luck getting this in your hand luggage!

But still, I don't get why people don't go for the best of both worlds. Plug the laptop into a dock in the picture above, and you can still take your hobby on the road when your wife insists you join for that 3 day visit to the in-laws.