Toshiba Satellite L505-ES5018

Pros: Number pad, widescreen, good processor, enough hard drive space for a laptop, portable.

Cons: Hypersensitive touchpad. Awful battery life (often <1 hour, never more than 2). Terrible graphics card. If you want to run any game that is less than 10 years old, get a different computer. And you're stuck with it too.

Summary: I can't find a compatible graphics card to replace the current one with, and that is sort of a dealbreaker for me. Also, the speakers are pretty weak, which is good if you don't want to bother anyone near you, but bad if you're trying to show them a funny video. On my laptop neither the headphone output nor microphone input is functional, so you can't plug in better speakers or a better mic than the built-in ones (unless you use expensive recording equipment that has a usb connection...)

All in all it does most of what I need it to do for work and school, but recreationally I have not had a good time with this computer, and it sucks up power constantly because the battery is so sub-par. I was really glad to get a laptop that functions at all in the $400 range, especially one with a proper number pad, so I consider myself lucky. I just wish that some of the functionality was better, or even improvable through a little DIY work.