Laptop recommendations?

Many years ago I used this group for its original purpose. Now I just abuse
it, sorry. The Canadian government has made it clear that I need to upgrade
my laptop by Jan 31 (its changed some taxation rules). So I'm leaning on old
friends for recommendations.

My needs:

1. Budget <2000 Canadian

2. 15 inch screen

3. More battery life is better. Currently my XPS 1530 gets about 1:20 which
I'm always looking for a plug. Ideally I would get 3 hrs when not doing
compute intensive tasks.

4. Weight no worse than XPS M1530 (6 lbs)

5 CPU Core I7 (at least this what I assume I want), 8 GB RAM. 500 GB 7200
RPM Harddrive

6. Use: Development and photo editing (Lightroom and Photoshop). More
Horsepower better in these cases, although I'm happy to work using an outlet
in that case.

7. USB 3.0 and other goodies are nice but not mission critical


Basically I spend a lot of time on the road and need a good machine that I
can carry and use every where. After digging for a few hours it appears that
the current Dell XPS's get bad reviews for: design and longevity, battery
life and lack of USB 3.0. The HP Envy takes a knock because the palm rest
becomes very hot even when browsing the web.


Thoughts?

Mark

   *Mark Levison* | Agile Pain Relief
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