Laptop Recommendations. Please!

[GhostGT]

Hey all,

I'll keep this short and sweet. Looking to buy a laptop for my dad (replacing his old and clunky 16" Vaio powerhouse). He's basically looking for a 14" laptop, and the following are required specs:

- Great battery life
- Optical DVD drive
- non-touch screen
- Up to ~$800 budget

Any recommendations?

Here's one that I've been looking at... but it doesn't seem like the battery life is anything to write home about:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834230785



Best,

Chris

 

[GhostGT]

Can't edit anymore, so here's an update: He'd actually prefer a bigger laptop, so something around 15" will be preferable.

 

[BK_123]

Newegg.com - Asus VivoBook S550CA-DS51T 15.6" LED Ultrabook - Intel Core i5 i5-3317U 1.70 GHz - Black, Also do you have any preferred brands?

 

[GhostGT]

I recall seeing that one; just need to look into some battery life tests. Also, there's a preference for a non-touchscreen model. Does this particular one come without a touchscreen?

Brand-wise, my dad is a fan of HP and Sony, but he doesn't mind purchasing another brand-name model.

 

[jmacavali]

Under $800 you might have trouble finding battery life to write home about. The impressive battery life usually comes in the "ultra-books" which tend to be around the $1000 mark.

$600 - $800 Laptops - CNET Reviews

 

[GhostGT]

What do you consider impressive when it comes to battery life? My father's 16" Vaio is an i7 powerhouse; he can't even get a solid 1.5-2 hours of usage before it dies. I'm hoping that I can find a model that offers a minimum of 3-4 real-world hours... does that VivoBook seem to be one of them?