Question Out of touch with tech trends, need help buying budget laptop

[Giovannimb]

First off, thanks to anyone who reads this post and takes the time to respond and answer any of my questions.

I am in the market for a gaming laptop. I am also about 8 years out of touch with PC technology and am having a hard time determining what I should be looking for in terms of power and value. My budget for the laptop itself is about 800 dollars, and I am willing to buy used or refurbished in order to achieve some more power for my dollar. I would prefer a 17inch over a 15, but have noticed 15 inch laptops having more reasonable power/value ratios, unless there is something I don't understand about the various components. Is it better that I get a 15inch laptop and hook a monitor to it? Is that possible or worth it? I'm not looking to run anything crazy, classic WoW, LoL, maybe some higher end titles, but on medium settings. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks again!

 

[Precedentbugv]

What's the point of hooking up a monitor? Just buy a mid tier gaming desktop.
Lots of tutorials on how to put it together if you're gonna be buying parts

And you don't need to spend 800 bucks to run something like LoL or world of warcraft
They're fairly old games and easy to run on even high settings

 

[Giovannimb]

What's the point of hooking up a monitor? Just buy a mid tier gaming desktop.
Lots of tutorials on how to put it together if you're gonna be buying parts

And you don't need to spend 800 bucks to run something like LoL or world of warcraft
They're fairly old games and easy to run on even high settings

As far as the monitor goes, I just like the idea of a larger display when I'm not on-the-go/traveling with my laptop. I really would prefer something in the 17inch category.

I would like to play some more recent titles on medium or so settings, I'm just not sure how far 800 dollars will get me in terms of computing/graphics power. I also mentioned how I was considering used/refurbished and was hoping to be pointed in a reliable direction. Do you have any resources to help me figure that out?