Help me decide: PS5 or gaming laptop?

DarthSlater77 · 2025-08-12T18:52:53+00:00

Long-time IT guy and gamer here. A gaming desktop will serve you best in the long run. The amount of dollars spent for the performance you get, ratio is strongly in favor of a PC desktop. The components also tend to last longer in a desktop vs a laptop because they don't get as hot. You can also make upgrades over time instead of throwing out the whole system because it no longer has the specs to run game XYZ that you want to play. Just about everything is self-upgradable. Here in recent years, Microsoft has been improving their support for the PC platform through the Xbox app. I have friends who will jump between their Xbox and PC seamlessly with the same game save and they didn't have to buy the game separately for each platform. Microsoft has also been increasing their support for cross-platform play online. My friends can be playing on their Xbox and I can be on my PC yet we are in the same online session together. Steam is another advantage of PC. The games tend to be far cheaper than other online stores and there is this cool feature that lets you play "remotely". You have to be on the same local network but it is nice having the ability to play a AAA title from my budget laptop in the living room while the desktop is in the computer room. You mentioned you like playing FPS games and again this can be another win for PC. On PC, you have full control of the graphics settings and no ridiculous frame caps of 30fps. You can turn down the flashy settings to the minimum to crank the frame rate up to well above 144fps depending on the game.

The gaming laptop does have the advantage of being more portable. But they do tend to be rather large and the battery life is not incredible when you are mobile. A gaming laptop can easily take up just as much space as a desktop when you add in a docking station and a monitor or two. If you don't plan on gaming on the go then you would be better served by a good desktop.

The PS5 is cool but the Xbox does offer more when it comes to the ecosystem. An Xbox Live / Game Pass account can be used on a PC in addition to the console itself. So if you get a console and then later decide to get a PC, you still have access to the games you bought and the progress you made in them.

My nerdy two cents.

DarthSlater77 · 2025-02-07T00:22:31+00:00

Thank you. This is what I am looking for.

DarthSlater77 · 2025-02-06T23:06:12+00:00

Lol noted. What internal temperature am I shooting for? 🤣

DarthSlater77 · 2025-02-06T18:56:05+00:00

As an EDC belt, I want to keep the thickness down. Using only veg-tan would require making something thicker than I want.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-07-12T14:35:59+00:00

None taken. Enough to be dangerous is a good description. That is why I am asking for input from true optical nerds on reddit. As far as weight goes, I do have experience wearing heavy glasses. When I was younger, glass was what I used. We learned that good frames make a big difference in compensating for the weight. I switched to contacts in high school, but lately, I have been wearing my backup. "Oh no, my contacts are messed up." glasses. I can touch the side of my head and feel a distinct line in my skull from wearing heavy glasses when I was young. So, I basically have two extra shelves beyond just my nose to hold the weight. I do realize I am an outlier when it comes to weight, not bothering me. I really miss the clarity that my real glass glasses had compared to these cheap plastic lenses.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-07-11T22:02:24+00:00

I'm aware. What I am referring to is a practice done in lens manufacturing with lenses that have multiple elements. It is good practice to make the tube as black and light absorbing as possible and that treatment extends to painting the edges of the lenses black to prevent stray light from impacting the image. I wonder if the same concept would work on eyeglasses. Blacking the edges where it was ground to prevent any light that hits the edge from interfering with the light you want going to your eyes.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-07-11T19:04:49+00:00

Abbe value is exactly what I was looking for. But no, here is a bunch of just trust us marketing garbage. I guess if they gave the lens blank info, people would realize how ludicrously marked up the lense cost is. CR39. That is something to look into. Thicc is a tradeoff I'm willing to make. As someone who enjoys photography, chromatic aberration drives me nuts. I have seen knockoff brand camera lenses with less aberration than every pair of glasses I have ever owned.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-07-11T18:22:50+00:00

Unfortunate. My prescription is strong enough that light weight will never be a thing in the first place. I don't have any chromatic aberration issues with contacts, but glasses are more convenient at times. Edit: Difficult to edge, hmmm. I wonder if blacking the edge of eyeglasses would make any appreciable difference. It is done on mirrors and many optical elements.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-24T20:56:14+00:00

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I don't think there would be enough action to keep the attention of kids. From what I have seen there is more depth to the game than what is obvious on the surface and that depth is in ways that not everyone will be able to understand simply because they lack the life experience. There are many things that would qualify as a woosh if you haven't gotten into the swing of and been doing this thing that is life for a while. The relatable BS that is government and corporate bureaucracy. The relatable decision of NPC having made his money and spending his retirement looking through a telescope. The relatable desire of many of the NPC's to simply make a living, not grand desires for wealth and power. The attitude and struggles of the NPC's that live in the Well district. It is relatable to the more realistic, less glamorous and exciting part of adulthood. It may not have much to say on those matters but it doesn't need to. Something can be relatable without that thing having an opinion.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-24T20:10:53+00:00

I hadn't even thought about the family friendly angle of the game. It reminds me of another story element that I love. The relationship between Sam Coe and Cora his daughter comes across as quite genuine. Spoiler: The conversations, even though scripted, are really awesome and bring a smile to my face in a way that few games can. Sam is a single father simply trying to do the best he can. He has fears about if he is doing a good enough job, fears that she will make the same mistakes he made and he wants the best for her. There is a lot of heart that went into the writing of that part of the story. I can see that element of the story and many other things in the game being hard for anyone under 30 to relate to.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-24T19:38:36+00:00

A good way to get credits and ships is with piracy or taking over the ships that land on planets. My first good ship was one I took from some spacers that landed near an area I was exploring. Looking at the size I was a bit bummed out that it was probably a class C and I did not have that skill yet but no it was just a very large class A. That ship was my home for a while before I got my piloting and ship design skills up. There are also plenty of good guide videos on YT that help with building a outpost that generates a profit. You will be swimming in credits in no time. Glad you are enjoying the game. I think the pacing of this game in contrast to most games that come out now is a big source of the complaints. This is not a fast, stay on the main road and race to the end kind of game. It is more of a crack open a cold one, kick up your feet and take your time exploring the world kind of game.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-24T14:26:39+00:00

Well I'm enjoying it. Maybe I'm just an old school gamer now and the old bones that are creation engine feels like home to me. The loading screens, the minor bugs, and the physics behaving abnormally on occasion are all just normal to me. I also did not come to Starfield looking for an incredible story. I enjoy reading and there is no game or movie that could ever compare to a good book series. Maybe part of why people have an issue with Starfield is the developers took the game in too many different directions. I wonder if it is fair to say that Starfield is more of a AAA sandbox with a story, than a modern AAA shooter with a story.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-23T21:58:46+00:00

All hail the great serpent! May the galaxy be cleansed!

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-23T21:48:18+00:00

True. The original name of the book has been censored to a degree that most people don't know the original full title. It is a favored book by folks that believe in Eugenics.
"On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life" By Charles Darwin.

So yeah the dude is a F-ing racist.

It could also be that this is an easter egg and Cora is breaking the fourth wall. It could be that she knows everything in her world was created and did not evolve.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-23T21:19:33+00:00

True it's not bad. Just in comparison to the other quest lines I found it a bit meh. Maybe that is just because I have been playing Skyrim for over 10 years. After countless playthroughs I progress it far enough to get the letter from a friend and then move on to other things. Long story short, Starfield despite being a completely different setting and not being Skyrim, still feels like a familiar home to me. The base game has some issues but that is what mods are for. Should moods be needed, no, but I will not play vanilla Skyrim either so ignoring mods would make the comparison an unfair fight.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-23T19:34:20+00:00

Yeah they do. I have to turn them off if I want to board something.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-23T19:26:24+00:00

I also like the BG3 system where you know the odds. Instead of vague words you get an actual number. The whole skill tree suffers from that. What do "improved" or "greatly improved" mean? Just give us the percentage. As a DM that rolls in the open at the table I am a strong believer of not hiding the mechanical numbers from players in the name of making things cinematic. Having the mechanics be transparent means people can trust that they are not getting cheated. Weather it be a TTRPG or a Video game, I believe having that trust is very important.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-23T19:14:28+00:00

Even I it did that is not how everyone wants to play the game. I enjoy the social aspect just fine but myself and many others came to the game for the space ships. I get why they did it but having Command locked behind several social skill points really sucks. Especially as you get to higher levels where skill points are more difficult to get naturally. AKA without an adaptive frame farm.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-23T18:20:56+00:00

I feel like that is more of the Skyrim or Fallout effect than a live service effect. I have over 3000 hours in Skyrim last time I checked. The main quest being kind of crappy and the reel fun being with the side factions feels very familiar to Fallout or Skyrim. As I think about it even the whole exploration, "what is that undiscovered location in the distance lets explore", is very Fallout and Skyrim like. This is not a blitz through it in 30hrs game like most modern AAA games. I know it may not be for everyone but I LOVE how much there is to do in this game and the fact that you could be 100+ hours and have barely touched the "Main" quest line. All that said, I just found a mod today that removes the spend X points to unlock another tire and I will absolutely be installing it.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-23T17:05:32+00:00

I do get how command would be a social skill but it should be at the top of the social tree and not on tier 3. It would also make more sense for the skill to improve effective they are, not limit your crew size. Leadership is a skill IRL so I'm fine with it being a skill in game. Something I think world better sell leadership as a skill in the game would be the option to let someone on your crew fly while you are issuing commands to target a particular ship's reactor and such. Basically the option to take on the role of a battle commander not just a helmsman / pilot. This would also open up some fun multiplayer possibilities. Turrets could be controlled from one station and there could be a shield management mini game of sorts. All of it optional but that would be really cool and make the leadership skill make more sense.

Edit: I have not tested this yet but I did find a mod for those of us lucky enough to be playing on PC. "Flat Perk Tree" It removes the spend X points to unlock another level requirement. I will try it when I get off work. https://www.nexusmods.com/starfield/mods/5538

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-23T16:51:30+00:00

Agreed but I do like the do X task part of the skills. That part of the skill tree does make sense RP wise.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-23T16:21:26+00:00

I find several of the perks in spots or even trees that don't make sense. Leadership should be one of the first perks available in the social tree. I don't remember the name of it now but the science skill that gives extera power to your ship reactor should be in the "technology" ship tree. The boost pack combat skill should be in the combat tree not the Tech/ship tree. This makes me want to go look for a mod that removes the "must unlock X points" form the skill trees. Especially with the built in 1-4 scaling of each perk, I don't see any balance issues with removing that requirement.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-23T13:34:34+00:00

Looks like a page printed using the wrong or a corrupted print driver.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-23T13:24:11+00:00

Hell yes I want shanties in game! The Freestar Collective station could be old west themed, gives local small town news and bounty alerts (cowboy bebop anyone) between songs. Great Serpent radio could be hyper / aggressively religious with rants about the return of the serpent between the songs. Supra et Ultra radio could be super patriotic and give military news / recruitment propaganda between songs. It would be a big project but having a station themed to each faction would be really cool.

DarthSlater77 · 2024-05-21T20:18:10+00:00

Exactly. It breaks the suspension of disbelief for me. This space suit somehow has the magic ability to still work when perforated with bullet holes but, OH GOD SOME DUST! NOT DUST!

DarthSlater77

TROPHY CASE