QuantumPhysics
Posts: 6,306 +7,258
A laptop uses low-power components, and does not allow you to freely choose those components. It also comes with a screen and a clamshell, which in certain situations is undesirable.
Finally, SFF is about more than portability; I haven't moved my SFF since it was originally built.
Why would a screen and clamshell be undesireable?
I have a gaming laptop and I can leave the screen closed, connect a keyboard, mouse and my AW988 headset on Bluetooth and play wirelessly while it's connected to a larger TV or display.
This especially comes in handy when I go on international vacations. A Laptop is a hell of a lot easier to deal with.
#1 You can use it at the airport easily.
#2 You can use it on the plane easily.
#3 It's small and thin so it easily fits in regular bags.
#4 Even the low power components are still powerful enough to run demanding games: Core i7 with a 2070 and 64GB DDR4 - and you don't sacrifice having the power of an actual desktop.
A Core i7 with 2060 and 16GB of DDR4 and 1TB SSD is roughly $1100 ($1000 on sale).
That's a pretty damn good amount of power in a convenient size. The HP OMEN for example is a killer deal with those specs.
There's nothing but upsides in my opinion.
A full sized SSF PC may save space on the CPU, the Cooler, the SSD, and the RAM, but a desktop PSU and GPU are gonna make it absolutely larger than it needs to be.
My GPU and my PSU alone are larger and heavier than my laptop.