So I need a new laptop, HELP! Suggestions needed!

Really, when it comes to laptops, the real question is: "how much are you willing to blow?"

to mirror the hdd, I'd just get an exterrnal drive and keep it on the desk to serve as backup.

I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a laptop that weighs over 10 pounds. To the extreme of lightweight, if you're up for spending $500-$800 more than your specs call for, you can get one of those ultra-portable laptops whose only downside (aside from monitor/keyboard size)is they break more easily.

Spending an extra 100 bucks for an upgrade to a... say... GeForce 8400M will get you dual monitor support... but even some on-board graphics accelerators give you that these days.

If you're looking for a name to roll with - Lenovo Thinkpads are solid, and built to last. I'd own one myself, but I've opted, instead, for a more inexpensive HP to simply keep me plugged in as I bounce from desktop to desktop in my day.

dell under $400 refurb

I've got about 2700 invested in my Sony Vaio. It's lightweight and all but it's a piece of shit. I'll never buy another Sony laptop.

Toshiba and Dell have both done me right.

You could also try looking at Sager, Asus or some other generic brand. First laptop I bought was a generic Asus (one i'm typing on now). Albeit you may be getting less of immediate support than Dell would offer but it's a great laptop.

Yeah... I came to the conclusion about 5 years ago that I was no longer going to support Sony in any respect where I could help it. That company has some issues, imho.

ibm made great in past... not sure about their brand Lenovo

I have a new ThinkPad T60P with all the bells and whistles. I paid $2,600.00 for it and I totally regret the purchase. It?s been back to Lenovo twice and I?m still having problems with it. The video is dull and the screen jumps while running some of my Adobe and Corel applications. Lenovo?s response is that I need to live with it.

We bought Acer all around 12 months ago on Laptops and dont regret except for one thing....Battery life..... was interested in the sony for what seems like longer battery life.

May have to stick with Acer and a couple spare batteries each

just ordered a alienware m9750
base price is 1800