Sure, if you want to get a fancy laptop with a shiny shell, and other extra features, you have to open your wallet wide and wider. But you don't have to! You got a choice! You can make the choice! You are the boss!
Because for $350, after a $30 Easy Rebate (which can be submitted online), you can get a nicely spec'ed (for the price) Compaq Presario dual-core laptop! A laptop's laptop, not one of them skinny netbooks ;-)
You get a 15.6" widescreen display (16:9 aspect ratio), 3gb of DDR2 memory (max 4gb), 250gb hard disk, Intel Pentium dual-core T4200 processor (2 GHz), wifi, and even a free upgrade to Windows 7, which will liberate you from the chains of Vista Home Premium that comes installed out of the box :)
Other feautres include:
* full-size keyboard with dedicated numeric keypad (yum!)
* dvd burner with lightscribes
* memory card reader
* three USB slots, VGA output, Ethernet, and such
* battery life up to 2 hours and 45 minutes ("up to", not guaranteed!)
* one year warranty
* no webcam, no HDMI out
* just over six and a half pounds (weight)
The price is good from Sunday September 20 until close of business on Saturday September 26. You can also look it up on the Staples.com website by entering the product code 802760 inside any of their Search boxes.