I recently posted about finding time to game as a parent and the community has provided a bunch of good suggestions. Thank you! After reading all comments, I think it really boils down to accessibility of gaming for the occasional moments of free time that I do have in my busy schedule. The ability to pick something up easily, make some progress, pause it, and resume quickly at the next available window appears the best way to go. Many have suggested a Steam Deck or Switch (I own the latter) but I wanted to get some opinions on gaming laptops. My preference is to play on PC (I subscribe to Game Pass) so that’s why I brought up this topic. I believe a gaming laptop provides some form of mobility and plays most things but doesn’t have the instant resume that makes handhelds great. I feel both the Steam Deck and Switch would be limiting in what I can play. Has anyone tried the ROG Ally? What are your thoughts?
My experience as someone who owns a HP Omen gaming laptop:
Not as portable and convenient as you may think. It weighs about 5 pounds, like a bag of potatoes. It uses a lot of power and needs to be plugged in if you want to play for longer than 45 minutes. The charger consists of a heavy cable a power block. I can however move it from the Study to the Living room if I wish to.
It boots up extremely quickly. I can go from power off to playing a game in about 5 minutes. I can exit a game and leave the power turned on, and then reopen the game and start playing within a minute.
It has a 2080 super graphics card which means I can play any game I want. I have never had any performance issues even playing games like Elden Ring on max settings.
It was expensive. Seriously look into refurbished options if possible. I got mine refurbished, works like brand new and have had no problems over the past 4 or so years. I saved about £3k doing this if I remember correctly.