I am in the market for a new laptop/ultrabook before the end of the financial year (like many others are).
I have been eyeing off the Xiaomi Mi Notebook Air 13.3 (i5-6200U/940MX/8GB-RAM/256GB SSD) - but uncerntain of the quality etc
Requirements:
$1000 or under
Ultra thin - travel friendly!
Less than 2kg
Around 13" - small form factor
Moderate gaming
Not touch-screen
Any recommendations or recent purchases around these lines would be greatly appreciated :D
I would get myself a Gen 2 Thinkpad 13. 13.3” Intel i5-7200U 4GB 128GB SSD. Rugged enough. Light and slim and better than average battery life. Integrated graphics is good enough for LOL and similarly demanding games.
$782.26 + Delivery from Kogan
https://www.kogan.com/au/buy/lenovo-thinkpad-13-gen2-educati…
But T460 is also pretty sweet. You will have many years of service with the T series.
T460-i7-6600U-vPro-8GB-192GB-SSD $998
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Lenovo-ThinkPad-T460-i7-6600U-vPr…
T460P-FHD-Core-i5-6300HQ 4GB, 500GB HDD $1099 (might want to upgrade ram and HDD to SSD but it does have a proper quad core and IPS FHD screen)
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Lenovo-ThinkPad-T460P-Notebook-14…
That E470 deal blonky mentioned is hard to beat. If you wait awhile they might do the deal again?
I'll go for the e470 or t460. Only other competition is the Xiaomi Air, but with no local after sale service, I wouldn't recommend it despite that it's a fantastic laptop.
If you don't mind putting a little extra money, the e470 has a 1050 option.
Lenovo T460 or similar - expect to pay around $900-$1000 for i5, 8GB ram, 128GB SSD, 14" screen, under 2kg, GeForce 940m or similar - will run some games at low res but it's really not much better than integrated. Having said that, Intel Iris graphics are pretty decent for integrated. They go on sale very often, see past deals on ozbargain
Otherwise
Dell Latitude 14" 7000 series
From the Dell DFO - as new or refurbished (but often look like new), expect to pay around $800 for an i5, 8GB ram, 128GB SSD, 14" FHD IPS screen, but will have integrated graphics
edit - see this recent deal -Lenovo E470, i7, 16GB, 256GB SSD, 940MX for $900 https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/300754
You probably won't get anything better for the price