Make me not buy a laptop....

I use my work laptop for occasional personal use, but our IT policy prevents me from installing s/w (Quicken, Blackberry Desktop, Map-tech Chart Viewer). I have considered buying 13.3-14" Intel based laptop (ThinkPad, Dell, Sony), priced ~$1000. But, I might build a home system and use remote desktop on my work pc to access. Details below. Looking for the today's performance/price/enegy efficiency sweet spot.

APPROXIMATE PURCHASE DATE: <1 Month

BUDGET RANGE: $400-700 (will consider higher if justified)

SYSTEM USAGE FROM MOST TO LEAST IMPORTANT: Quicken, Internet, Picasa / Other photo apps, light-duty Excel, occasional HD/blu-ray if system allows.

PARTS NOT REQUIRED: Keyboard / Mouse / Monitor

PREFERRED WEBSITE(S) FOR PARTS: NewEgg is fine

COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: USA

PARTS PREFERENCES: Intel CPU, 1TB+ HDD, EVGA, Giga-byte or Asus MBs.

OVERCLOCKING: Maybe.

SLI OR CROSSFIRE: No

MONITOR RESOLUTION: up to 1920x1200. lower resolutions are fine.

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: As I mentioned, this PC will likely be accessed by remote desktop via my work laptop, but I may end up setting it up in my home office. Ability to WOL out of standby would be a nice feature. I have investigated options to build a system ranging from an Atom 330 (seems a bit underpowered for Quicken?), all the way to an i5. Smaller form factors with cutting edge power / power consumptions are ideal, as the system would be idle most of the day. But, I would also accept a LianLi mid-tower or equivalent. ITX or mATX boards. I am not a gamer. Prefer an 80+ power supply, but not necessary. Price difference needs to be enough to make the build vs buy decision easy. I am comortable with system building. System upgrade path nice, but not required. If going Win7, I need an OS (own a copy of XP that would work).

Sure. Here are my priorities.

1. Price
2. Performance for intended use
3. Form Factor
4. Efficiency
5. Upgrade path

The PC will be used for web browsing, Quicken personal finance s/w, light-duty Office applications (no Monte Carlos in Excel). It will also serve as a respository for storing digital pictures (no video) - I use Picasa as my photo organizer, currently. No gaming.

I would give up performance to meet a budget. Ideally, I'd stick this thing in a closet attached to wired network, and use my work PC to WOL/remote desktop into the home PC for a couple of hours each night.

I am stuck between building a 'Budget' PC to use for the next couple of years, vs. something more mainsteam (i5-750 based) for 3-5 years or longer.

And, yes, the IT policies have gotten tougher - we have a new CTO. Folks like me that had local admin rights on their machines got them taken away. Understandable, yes, but also inconvenient for me.

Thanks again.