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My sister-in-law is heading off to college next year, and my wife and I are planning to get her a laptop as a graduation gift. Any advice on which brands are the best in terms of lightweight, reliable (no crashing), and durable (don't shatter into 1000 pieces if you drop them off a couch or desk).

I've had pretty good experiences with Dells - they're durable and reliable - and I've been told that Lenovo's are good as well. I've had mixed experience with Toshibas - some were excellent and others have had serious design flaws.

Pricewise we're looking to spend less than $1000 - ideally $800 or so.

The majority of my laptop customers have an HP or Compaq. Of those with actual hardware issues, HP/Compaq customers represent a good 90%. Usually this entails re-soldering the power jack, which does not come cheap.

I've seen various issues with every other brand - no one has a perfect reputation.

Some of it stems from simply how they treat their laptop, I think. A rather common problem is overheating, which, because a different brand will have its vents, etc. in different spots, they may consistently have a problem with one brand, and not another. A few customers with way too many pets and way too little cleaning means lots of hair in the heat sinks.

A few friends of mine have had good experience/luck with Asus laptops. They've been recommended on this board before.

I've had a relatively good experience with my HP. She can get a decent machine from them for under a grand with enough ram and power to do most tasks. Their customer service is also fairly good, so if anything under warranty needs replacing it gets done super-fast. (I had to send it in to get the screen fixed once and it took less than 48 hours).

Dell or Lenovo. They have great support, from what I hear. Tip: try to get the business models, rather than the consumer ones. Business models may look uglier, but they tend to have better build-quality control, and support.

Why am I emphasizing support? I'm fricking sick of free IT work.

I'm very happy with my Acer Laptop, been working no problem sice I got it a year ago. ALthough occasionaly the screen switches itself off.

Crazedwraith wrote:I'm very happy with my Acer Laptop, been working no problem sice I got it a year ago. ALthough occasionaly the screen switches itself off.

By switches itself off, do you mean "goes into power saving"?

General Zod wrote:

Crazedwraith wrote:I'm very happy with my Acer Laptop, been working no problem sice I got it a year ago. ALthough occasionaly the screen switches itself off.

By switches itself off, do you mean "goes into power saving"?

No. Very Occasionally the screen will literally just turn black or sometimes light green for no reason, in the middle of doing something and then the only thing that seems to work is switching the machine off or to stand by and starting it again. Its odd but not a huge problem.

Crazedwraith wrote:

General Zod wrote:

Crazedwraith wrote:I'm very happy with my Acer Laptop, been working no problem sice I got it a year ago. ALthough occasionaly the screen switches itself off.

By switches itself off, do you mean "goes into power saving"?

No. Very Occasionally the screen will literally just turn black or sometimes light green for no reason, in the middle of doing something and then the only thing that seems to work is switching the machine off or to stand by and starting it again. Its odd but not a huge problem.

Uh, sorry, that's a huge problem. It's well outside of the norm for any nearly new laptop to do that without some weirdass power-saving bug. I'd suggest having yours get sent in ASAP.

You may well have trouble finding a well-built laptop in that price range. The Lenovo ThinkPad R-series might fit that budget, but it'll be a stretch.