Recent content by Avram Piltch

We tested the regular Inspiron 11 3000. Performance was "ok" but not great. You're better off with something more robust like the Asus E403SA or ThinkPad 13.

If your dad is willing to get an external DVD drive, he can get a pretty decent web-surfing laptop for under $200. Our favorite in this price range is the Lenovo Ideapad 100S (http://www.laptopmag.com/reviews/laptops/lenovo-ideapad-100s) which weighs just over 2 pounds, lasts over 9 hours on a...

If you want to do productivity work (and not gaming), consider a business laptop. You can get really good performance and fantastic battery life out of those. Amongst , all business laptops, we love the ThinkPad T460 most, because of its 13+ hours of battery life and fantastic keyboard. However...

Asus's GL552 meets that criteria, though it is designed for gaming (http://www.laptopmag.com/reviews/laptops/asus-rog-gl552) Dell's Inspiron 15 7000 uses AMD graphics, but it's pretty good for the money (http://www.laptopmag.com/reviews/laptops/dell-inspiron-15-7000) Obviously, if you want to...

The answer really depends on your needs, not just your budget. I encourage you to check our Laptop Finder which steps you through several questions to help you: http://www.laptopmag.com/laptop-finder That said, if portability is most important to you, the Dell XPS 13 is a great choice (it...

Such an interesting question. If gaming isn't important to you, get the SurfaceBook because it weighs a lot less and lasts much much longer on a charge (12 hours in our tests): http://www.laptopmag.com/reviews/laptops/microsoft-surface-book

Can you stretch your budget to maybe $800? At that price, you can get the Dell Inspiron 15 7000, which is really quite good for gaming. Our review here: http://www.laptopmag.com/reviews/laptops/dell-inspiron-15-7000. Also, here's a list of best sub-$1000 gaming laptops...

Check out our list of Best Gaming Laptops on Laptop Mag: http://www.laptopmag.com/gaming-laptops Our favorite under $1,000 is the Asus GL552. You can get a config of the Alienware 17 for $1,499.

We have a list of our top picks at Laptop Mag (sister site to TG): http://www.laptopmag.com/college-laptops You said that you want to spend more than $500 right? Our top overall pick is the ThinkPad 13, which starts at $611 with an SSD, 1080p display, USB Type-C charging, a MIL-SPEC tested...