Searching for affordable but sturdy laptop

[Lee Morrow]

I've been searching around for an affordable but sturdy laptop, and I thought i'd post here for some suggestions. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

What I'm searching for is a good, solid, laptop in the 400-550 dollar range that has a decent processor and that can handle some light multitasking. I'm hoping to find one that is fairly compact and will last quite a while without the hardware degrading too much. The largest problem I have had in this search is finding too many laptops that have things I would be paying for but never actually use, for example a touch screen. I have also been unable to find laptops that have good build quality but do not include unnecessary SSDs and and processors.

I have always preferred the build quality of Lenovo and Asus laptops, but that doesnt necessarily mean I am limited to those two.

Thanks in advance to anyone who has any insight or previous experience on this issue!

 

[htwingnut]

For $450-500 you're asking a lot. That's a budget laptop no matter how you look at it unless you go with a refurb unit from Dell, HP, or Lenovo's outlet stores. For $500 you're very unlikely to get an SSD, but I'd highly recommend one since it will make the experience so much better.