Need help choosing laptop/Can I upgrade parts myself?

1. What is your budget? <$1000 preferably the $700 mark

2. What is the size of the notebook that you are considering? 13'/15'

3. What screen resolution do you want? 1366 x 768 would be fine, higher is better but not crucial

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

5. How much battery life do you need? ~3hours+

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)? gaming is secondary, maybe like minecraft.

7. What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo/Video editing, Etc.) Mainly compiling code on the go, it's so i can code on the train etc also like general Microsoft office stuff like Word and Visio.

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

9. If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post their links. www.mwave.com.au is one

10. How long do you want to keep your laptop? 2/3 years

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

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. Don't mind, though have bad experience with Dell.

13. What country do you live in? Australia

14. Please tell us any additional information if needed. I also want to know can i just buy a cheaper laptop with less ram and stick 8gb drr3 in it myself? or like sticking an ssd in instead of a mechanical?