Time for a new laptop. Whats good these days?

emd023

Honorable
Jan 16, 2013
4
0
10,510
Ive been out of the PC game for several years now and just wanted to get some ideas from some of the experts on this forum. im looking to purchase a laptop in the $400-500 prince range. I will be using the laptop mostly for work but would like to be able to play some games on it when im away on a trip. Id like to have a backlit keyboard and hopefully a SSD. A few more questions:

I have been using windows 7 for a long time and LOVE it. I would rather not switch to a new OS if i dont have to. Are windows 8 and 10 (where is windows 9 lol?) any good and what do they bring to the table that 7 does not? Is it worth it to switch? If I purchase a new laptop will I even have the option to pick windows 7?
 

Intel Fanboy 772

Estimable
Jan 25, 2016
15
0
4,570
I recently bought LENOVO Z51-70, it seems about that price range, E555 may be nice also depending on configuration, G50-80 may be nice too.
Asus E5-573g (again lot of hardware combinations), all depends on your local stores :)

But all of theese have fairly average battery life (4-5h max)

Generally something with Intel i5-5200u, ang Geforce 940m could be nice, some may have hybdrid hard drives (have some SSD part)