Gaming Laptop/School Laptop for Mathematics Student

[Camel217]

1. What is your budget?
700-1000, preferably on the lower end

2. What is the size of the notebook that you are considering? 17"

3. What screen resolution do you want? open

4. Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop? desktop replacement

5. How much battery life do you need? 2-4 hours when not gaming

6. Do you want to play games with your laptop? If so then please list the games that you want to with the settings that you want for these games. (Low,Medium or High)? Skyrim (Med-high), Starcraft 2 (Medium-high), WoW (High-ultra)

7. What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo/Video editing, Etc.) Matlab (can be CPU intensive), have had to run a Virtual OS with Linux for one class. Pretty much it has to have a nice processor on it because they throw really weird programs at us.

8. How much storage (Hard Drive capacity) do you need? 500+

9. If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post their links. Wherever I can grab a good deal. However, Amazon and newegg both charge me tax (TN), so if there was a good deal on a site that wasn't located in TN, that'd be great.

10. How long do you want to keep your laptop? 3 years

11. What kind of Optical drive do you need? DVD ROM/Writer,Bluray ROM/Writer,Etc ? DVD-r

12. Please tell us about the brands that you prefer to buy from them and the brands that you don't like and explain the reasons. ASUS, I love their ROG models because most common with an extra bay to put in an SSD. Never had an interest in Dells.

13. What country do you live in?
US

14. Please tell us any additional information if needed.

Willing to buy refurbished/re-certified, will definitely buy a warranty in that case.
I've been looking at the Asus G73 ( http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834230111&Tpk=asus%20g73 ), with the warranty it's about $1037 for me.

There's a Lenovo http://www.amazon.com/Lenovo-10372KU-17-3-Inch-Laptop-Brown/dp/tech-data/B0051OJTPM/ref=de_a_smtd that almost meets my expectations, but the Radeon 6650m doesn't quite cut it. I might settle.


Lastly (I believe tigerdirect doesn't charge me sales tax, but I won't swear.) http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1104483&CatId=4965 Doesn't list it, but that particular processor has a max turbo frequency up to 2.93 GHz.

Any help is greatly appreciated, even if it's just a couple of sites that I should look at.

 

[mathnino]

rather than just looking at newegg, try looking at places like hp.com, where they actually have decent offers for med-high laptops.

Personally, I think that lenovo deal is a rip-off.

Try this laptop: dv7t quad series
http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/computer_can_series.do?storeName=computer_store&category=notebooks&a1=Category&v1=High+performance&series_name=dv7tqe_series&jumpid=in_R329_prodexp/hhoslp/psg/notebooks/High_performance/dv7tqe_series

You get i7, and with extra $75 (which i think is totally worth it), you can upgrade the graphics card from 7470m to 7690m. Although 7690m is still a lil weaker than GTX460m, it can still run the games you mentioned with the settings you wish (or better). Also, its resolution is in 1600*900, but you can upgrade it to 1920*1080 with extra $150. This is your call. (2 years limited warranty is already given, but you can add total-care warranty for extra $160 if you are concerned.) and 750gb 7200rpm with extra $20.

So with coupon applied (you can find this in the internet, it's everywhere), you get i7, 7690m, 1600*900resolution, 2 years limited warranty, 750gb 7200rpm for $900. With tax, it should be around 950~980 ish. The deal looks pretty similar to the ASUS one you suggested, but I would go for hp just because ASUS laptops look shoddy. This is totally my opinion though.

If you don't mind 15.6 inch, then you can get pretty much the same deal but $200 cheaper.

I've been looking at newegg, but I don't think I can find a deal similar to the ASUS or this HP. You can also look at sites like lenovo or Dell directly; they might give you a better deal, who knows.