Upgrading in the near future

[SpacedOut]

So I'm going to be leaving home soon and going to Uni, which means I'm finally going to be able to build myself a desktop. At present, while I share a computer area with my parents, I've always needed a laptop because we only have room for one desktop here and I need something I can take to school anyway.

My current laptop specs that relate to gaming are:

i7 q840 @ 1.87GHz 1.86GHz processor

Nvidia GTX 460M graphics card

218 gb of nothing special HDD, not SSD or anything like that.

6gb ram

My laptop isn't exactly a piece of crap, it runs most current games just fine provided I don't put all the settings on too high, which frankly doesn't concern me given that it's a laptop.

I just have a few questions with regards to the change from laptop to desktop:

1) In terms of prices, would I be right in assuming a desktop is less expensive than a performance-equivalent laptop? If so, by how much, and given that I'm looking to buy in about 6 months time, how much would a decent upgrade be (decent meaning latest gen of processor, a card from the newest nvidia series or equivalent card, MUCH better memory, and however much ram I'm going to need. When I say latest/newest, I mean from in 6 months time, not now).

2) I know the majority of people getting a desktop tend to build their own these days in order to save money. How hard is it to just get the parts and make one? I've never tried before, but I'm reasonably capable and think I can follow instructions quite well. Would it just be better though to take the parts to the local computer store repair and pay someone to help me to put it together, given that it would be my first try?

3) People with desktops seem to talk about overclocking a lot, but being a laptop user I've always been to scared to try, not knowing how well it would work out. Is this something considered 'necessary' to have an efficient gaming desktop? I know there are plenty of guides out there, but how hard is it really to do and is it at all risky?

Don't fell you need to answer all the questions, if anyone can share any insight into any of them then please just share what you know.

Thanking you in advance for any help!

[taekvideo]

1) yes that's right.. the biggest difference is in high-end desktops though, as the laptop equivalents skyrocket in price. In 6 months time you'd be looking at a 600 series nvidia or 7000 series amd gpu, and an ivy bridge intel cpu. You would probably be looking at $1000 to put together a standard high-end rig with the best gaming cpu and one of the best single gpu's.
2) It's really easy... like legos. If you're patient and follow the instructions you won't have any problems doing it without help.
3) Overclocking is stupidly easy on sandy bridge, and I assume it will be the same on ivy bridge. You just change the cpu ratio and you're done. There's more to it if you want to do heavy overclocks, but nothing you should have to worry about for your first time, as you'd probably just want to do a mild or moderate one. It's not really necessary, but it adds a lot more bang for your buck... and also let's your cpu last you another year or 2 before you have to upgrade, which is important since upgrading the cpu is a lot more expensive (need new mobo + ram as well usually). If you stick to a mild overclock... mild being like 4.2ghz up from 3.7ghz on the i5-2500k (can't say what it'll be on ivy bridge cpu's)... and have a decent aftermarket heatsink... then there's pretty much no risk.

[Milkshake86]

As for price to power a desktop at a $1500 price range will be closer to a $3000 laptop if not more to get anywhere near the same performance. Basically any laptop that is on par with a current gaming desktop is likely going to be massive in essence a desk top replacement. Battery life would be not so great and so on. However if your a college kid on the move alot then laptops are going to be wildly favorable but if your able to game in a nice chair desktop imo.

[SpacedOut]

Cool, thanks for the advice