Light Gaming/Study Laptop on a $700-800 budget? And where to buy from/compare options?

mccoolaustinm

Honorable
Jun 13, 2013
6
0
10,510
I really appreciate the help I've always received on this website for questions like this!

My points for this laptop:

1) I prefer something 15.6" or smaller. I don't want a large screen as I am also a student who needs to carry this baby around a lot. If it's possible to get something at 15.6" and it has a higher resolution than a similar, smaller laptop, I'd probably prefer that. Otherwise, smaller is probably better for me if at the same screen resolution (from what I've seen these are mostly 1366 x 768 and that is the bare minimum for me. I'd prefer 900 or 1080 if possible within this range.)

2) I'd rather not have some crazy chassis design. To me this just seems stupid if you plan to carry it around as it increases its appeal for being stolen. Simple and clean, if possible. Not a super important point though.

3) If discrete graphics options exist in this price range, I'd like that. It may be impossible to achieve this under an upper limit of $800. I'm not planning on running a bunch of powerhouse applications and games, but I need some basic functionality. My desktop is a $2000 beast and I'd like to be able to at least carry my files around easily and play my lighter games, like MMO's, on this laptop.

4) Not sure what it means to get faster wireless internet on a laptop, as I have no experience here, but if there are two options and one can support faster wireless for not too much more, I'd definitely pick that one. Within my home our service pumps out 100-150Mbps, depending on how many other devices are hogging it.

If something jumps to mind immediately, post it here! I've been researching around so its not like I'm completely uninformed, but all of my computer buying experience is with custom building my desktops, and that isn't a budgetable option for a laptop it seems. I'd just like some pointers! I don't know what websites I should be browsing to compare laptops of different brands within a specified price range, so a pointer there would help too.