Stop me from pulling the trigger.

So the only 1440x900 X200s I can find online for a reasonable price is a refurb from Tiger Direct.

8GB of DDR3 is $40, OEM 9-cell is $75, 128GB Samsung 830 is $109.

Grand total with shipping is $640. This is exactly what I paid for a bare X31 back in 2005, although the X31 was newer at the time (and has aged very well, I might add).

I'm a programmer, so my needs are a hi-res screen, good keyboard, good battery life, and a >100GB SSD. Graphics don't matter, speed doesn't matter (a C2D does me just fine). Cost matters.

So talk me out of dropping half a G on a three-and-a-half-year-old laptop instead of a full G on a specced X220.