Let's see if you guys can help me out on this one.

Recently, I've been looking for a laptop that would suit me well, but still not come out ridiculously expensive. I've been with Dell for quite a while now, but it seems now that they will fail me. (I probably shouldn't even have been with Dell.)

I would love an Macbook, but those simply come out too expensive for me.

I'm probably going to try not purchasing a laptop from a brand place (such as Dell or Apple). I've heard from my friend that he was able to configure a decent computer with Core 2 Duo processing, ATI Radeon video card for about $800.00 from some website. So I was wondering if any of you knew where I could get a deal like this.

In short, I need help purchasing a new laptop. Details as help comes.

You can configure stuff at ibuypower or cyberpowerpc but their build quality is hit or miss.

I'd recommend a cheap Acer, ASUS or Lenovo, though you'd be hard pressed to find a decent laptop with a good dedicated graphics for under $1000

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16834220122
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16834115365
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16834146269

Hm, I believe that's what website my friend was configuring his laptop on.

Oh yeah, I'm looking for a pretty efficient computer for photography and multi-tasking and running those heavy Adobe suite programs. I'm looking around or less than $2,000, so that should probably give a little bit more breathing room.

In addition, I'm not taking any of that hit or miss stuff. It's a hit or forget about it.

If you have the money to splurge, get Asus or Alienware.

Retail configured packages are good too, and cheaper.
Like this one. It's not Core 2 Duo, but it's just as good. My laptop has the exact same processor (AMD Turion 64 X2 TL52) and it works pretty well.
Its graphics card seems pretty good too--256MB dedicated, 256MB shared. Plus, the 2GB RAM would be good for multitasking.

Alienware is owned by Dell.

If it's a desktop, I want to say build it yourself, but if you really don't want to, just find something with as much processing power and as much ram as you can get. 2gb at the very least.

Why not buy a refurbished Macbook?

I've heard about how much Alienware owns, but aren't they also pretty expensive? Also, I'm going for a laptop, no desktops on this one.

About the refurbished Mac, where would I be able to get one? That actually might not even end up working out because I want to be able to customize the computer.

Some things I'm looking for:
- 17" WUXGA screen
- At least 2GB of RAM
- Intel Core 2
- N wireless card
- Dedicated graphics card

But all around or under $2,000.

Also, my thing about these other websites like Alienware, CyberPowerPC, and IBuyPower, is how their warranties are.

It'd also be nice if I could just not deal with the Vista and be able to just use XP as the operating system. Unless there's someone out there that'll convince me that Vista isn't all that bad?

This is the only one that meets your specs on newegg.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16834146281

If you can do without 802.11n, and can handle 802.11g/b then I'd recommend this ASUS or Toshiba

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16834220125
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16834114320

If you don't want to deal with Vista, just gather all the drivers you need, format, then install xp and the driver.

Alright, I've already found where I'm going to get my laptop from, I just got one other question.

Would it be better to purchase a laptop after the summer rather than now?
My mother suggested doing this since technology always improves so quickly (and the older stuff becomes cheaper).

I saved $300 buying my laptop at the end of August rather than buying it in June. But if you need it now, get it now.

Hm, alright, I'll probably do that then. Thanks James.