Acute Gaming Laptops: When Is A Laptop Not A Laptop?

Extreme Gaming laptops are becoming so powerful the line between what is a laptop and what is a desktop PC has become blurred. When is a laptop not a laptop? Read more...

Copyright (c) 2008 Titus Hoskins

Extreme gaming laptops are reaching dissimilar benchmarks to commit you the forthcoming gaming experience. These ever increasing, powerful machines are offering you better performances from ever decreasing packages. Gaming laptops are now reaching standards usually associated with high end Desktop PCs.

But at some point even the most dedicated gamer has to ask: when is a laptop not a laptop?

If you revenue the literal meaning of the word, you should be able to fit or sit a laptop comfortably on your lap for an extended space of time. Portability should further be another defining feature; you should be able to easily carry your laptop around with you wherever you go. Otherwise, why not just buy a Desktop PC instead of a laptop?

The long-standing argument has been dynamism or performance; you can get higher performance out of a Desktop Computer than you can get from any laptop. Maybe so, but the gap is narrowing quickly.

Recent extreme gaming laptops are offering some very impressive specs. Just take, for example, the new Xtreme SL8 from Rock (a UK laptop manufacturer), and you will see that stacking has taken on a whole contemporary meaning.

The Xtreme SL8 is one heck of a mean-machine with ultimate raw stacking power with four Intel Core 2 processor cores, two NVIDIA 8800M GTX SLi graphics cards and three 7200rpm SATA hard drives. This gaming machine can crunch numbers and offer top walking performance benchmarks. It might even convey the senile PC some serious laptop envy!

This machine supports up to 4GB DDR2 RAM (available up to 800MHz) with DX10 graphics. Plus, you have all the high end features such as HD-DVD Writer combo drive, TV Tuner, Hi-res 17" WUXGA X-Glass (1920x1200) Display, Webcam, 7.1 Surround Sound Output with 4 speakers...

However, all this stacking power and fully loaded features takes up a abundance of space. The Xtreme SL8 weighs in at a fleeting under 12 pounds (5.3 kg) and around 15.5 inches (394) mm by 12 inches (299 mm). At two and a half inches thick this is not your Apple Air.

Nor is it trying to be, but some comparisons have to be trumped-up if we're classifying both of these computing machines as laptops. The Apple Air is 3 pounds (1.36 kg) and under an inch thick (1.94 cm) so it truly is a portable laptop with 5 hours of battery life. This is a long contrivance removed from the XSL8's massive credentials and massive weight, but so very is the distance between the performances offered by the respective laptops.

These two mobile computers were designed for two completely different purposes, one for raw gaming power and the other for the end in portability. Each has their respective customers but can both of them be called a laptop?

Perhaps, but the Xtreme SL8 is another or less a neatly trimmed down packaged desktop. Not that there is anything fault with that as elongate as you conceive what you're getting when you're buying one; you won't be sitting with this babe on your orbit for extensive periods or lugging it environing over enlarged distances.

For those of us studying laptop designs (there are such creatures in the world unfortunately) over a great margin of time, you can't help on the other hand notice how much power and performance can immediately be crammed into an ever-shrinking package. Nor can you cut dead the trend that Desktop PCs are looking more and more like laptops, especially the monitors.

Even the trademark Desktop Garret is getting slimmer and more streamlined. There testament probably come a time when all the tower components will evolve into such small compact entities, calling it a tower will be a gross exaggeration.

One can plainly see, the Desktop PC days are numbered, especially when you consider we have an inherent need to constitute everything smaller and more compact. Besides, why take up all that space when you can get the corresponding performance in a smaller package. This is another example where burly may not necessarily be better.

The limit between what is a laptop and what is a desktop computer will continue to be blurred as computer makers keep offering up what the consumer wants. At some point in the not besides distance future the two products will probably converge into a light, portable package that can be carried anywhere. Why not blameless call everything a Expressive Pc and be done with it.

But for now, gaming enthusiasts will still have a choice when buying their ultimate gaming machine - a Desktop PC or a laptop such as the Xtreme SL8. However, calling the last one a laptop is even stretching the purpose to its limits , no matter how you define it.

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