Originally Posted by Wrexify

The two laptops you're looking at will do fine, but don't expect any big graphics performance from either of them unless you upgrade to one the beefier graphics card options. I can't speak to the Gateway FX, but it looks like a pretty solid deal.

As far as name brands go, it's really up to you. I've personally had some great laptops from ASUS, so I'll suggest this one for $1049: Newegg.com - ASUS N51Vf-X1 NoteBook Intel Core 2 Duo P8600(2.40GHz) 15.6" 4GB Memory 320GB HDD 7200rpm DVD Super Multi NVIDIA GeForce GT 130M - Laptops / Notebooks

To answer your name brand question, Lenovo tends to design for business users, Acer is pretty good for cheaper laptops, and Sony makes some damn sexy high-performance laptops, but you're going to pay about double what it's actually worth. Those are some pretty general statements, but that's been my experience in a nutshell.


edit: I'll second shakran, Sager makes some great performance laptops too.