Laptop for college

[Tmadness]

Having been a long time Linus/NCIX tech tips watcher I decided to ask the community for some advise. I'm starting college a few weeks and wanted to buy a laptop. Initially I had saved up around 2800$ and wanted to go for a premium grade laptop like the Thinkpad W540 or the Dell xps 15. But as Intel is battling the laws of physics and pushing its Broadwell laptops past the early 2015 mark, I have decided to buy a mid-high end ultrabook instead and use with my Sony vaio s15(which has a battery life that looks to be powered by a potato) for all the "heavy lifting".

 

My budget is around 900$, The laptop should have a good if not great screen running at at least 1080p , a awesome battery life(7.5+ hrs), a good keyboard with nice travel (I have been known to pound my keys) and a I5 with 8 gigs of RAM(I wouldn't worry too much about the storage capacity, 120 gigs should be just fine). The trackpad doesn't matter much but should have decent gesture support.

 

So far my searches have turned up the Dell xps 13(890$)

 

http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/Dell-XPS-13-4289-Touchscreen-Ultrabook---Intel-Core-i5/productID.304981600

 

and the ASUS Zenbook UX31LA(840$)

 

http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/ASUS-Zenbook-UX31LA-US51T-Signature-Edition-Laptop/productID.306270800

 

 as my main two choices. I have looked at the XPS 12 but the XPS 13 seems to be better(Battery life, bigger screen etc.)

 

 

**ALSO, I HAVE A STRICT POLICY AGAINST MACs.**  

[Benjio]

4K screen with 256GB SSD: http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/Acer-Aspire-S7-392-6425-Touchscreen-Ultrabook/productID.306261100??siteID=Es5Ekr9eEBk-AeYIgcSort_iecXm4CELOg

[werto165]

4K screen with 256GB SSD: http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/Acer-Aspire-S7-392-6425-Touchscreen-Ultrabook/productID.306261100??siteID=Es5Ekr9eEBk-AeYIgcSort_iecXm4CELOg

Is the 4k screen not a huge drain on the battery. 

[Tmadness]

The acer s7 does seem like a good option but the battery life  seems to be lower than its competitors(~6hrs 45min). also could anybody comment on the keyboard.

[brownix]

For battery life you can't go wrong with ultrabooks. But (and just be open about this, FYI I am not a Mac User) a macbook. Great battery life and it will get you through looking at websites and general school work. That is assuming you are not in computer science or engineering. (Did not read) But Tek Syndicate has a good review on Asus Zenbook UX***** (so many with the similar name). I would go with the zenbook. Better build than the XPS and one of the models has touchscreen so its comparable to XPS 13. But I trust Asus laptops more and it looks better. For that price which isn't a bad price if all you want is a general use laptop, with battery, and good keyboard you can't go wrong zenbook in my opinion. FYI I do not have either so take my opinion as an opinion. But i have just said stuff reviews have said before. Also I am pretty sure a newer zenbook has M.2 SSD so you will be able to upgrade that.