Laptop advice needed

Dissociater

Hey guys, I've never owned a laptop, I'm not typically a laptop person. But my wife and I are getting into some serious writing (she's going to be working on her PhD thesis, and I'm writing a book) so we need a second word processor. Ideally one that's not going to frustrate us with its slowness. So we decided that, instead of getting another desktop (which would require another desk!) we'd look into laptops.

We're thinking around $800 (Canadian). I have been looking at netbooks over the last few months more for the gadget-ness of it, but for this task I think we'd need a larger screen and a more comfortable keyboard.

Can anyone make any recommendations?

I was looking at the Sony VGN-CS108DQ Intel Dual Core T3200 3GB 250GB, it's on sale now for $775. Worth it, or can I do better for my budget.

Any general advice?

Thanks in advance.

Dedian

Have you looked into refurbished at all? I got an Inspiron 1525 (if you don't mind Dell) refurbed with Core 2 duo, 1G ram, a 7200 RPM hard drive (120G) for something like $400 about 6 months ago. It's on 24/7 and hasn't pooped out on me yet! This is mostly just to surf/email etc, but if you're doing important things, maybe a non-refurbed would be "safer"? I'm not sure on the warranty side...

Dissociater

I'm not adverse to refurb necessarily, although I would prefer new, and if my budget's around 800 I'd like to spend near the max of that and get good bang for my buck. Preferably I want something very fast with good storage space, that I'd be willing to compromise on in terms of video card, since I won't be gaming on it at all. The thing is, when it comes to laptop 'stats' I don't know what's good for the price like I sort of do with desktops.

Dissociater

Does anyone know anything about MSI laptops? Are they any good?