from experience in the shop acer = good for your money . but acer sucks to deal with for repairs on laptops. toshiba- check out the class action lawsuites against them for shitty laptops and overheating problems hp - havent seen too many issues. let me know how it goes AD lenovo has the new SL series and they would be under $1000 with tax. i just bought 2 of them for friends and they are getting great reviews