[jr2]

i7 720QM or 740QM, depending on model (1.6 or 1.73 GHz)

not sandy bridge or ivy bridge... not worth looking at.

Yeah I lucked out and got the 18" screen with the i7 2670QM (Sandy Bridge) with 6GB RAM and a 750GB HD for $1000 when Newegg had them cheap.  I was assuming 600 MHz wouldn't be that much of a difference -- is there some other disadvantages to the 720/740QM?

[LHN91]

IIRC pre-Sandy Bridge Core i-series chips were significantly slower per-clock than Sandy and Ivy Bridge and used more power.

[jr2]

Ah.  I heard Sandy Bridge was good, but the article I was reading was talking about overclocking.

Which you really shouldn't be doing in a laptop anyways. 

[Mikes]

For a semi-rugged outdoor capable system with true sunreadable screen, that can be used effectively while standing/walking and can be used as a regular laptop in a pinch as well (with the convertible keyboard addon), I'd always go for this again: http://www.motioncomputing.com/products/tablet_pc_J35.asp

Course, not so hot for gaming with only Intel HD3000 graphics.