Originally Posted by
nkedel
If you don't like the MacOS, I'd steer clear of the MacBook Air. One can run Windows on it, but instead of "just working" it becomes an bit of chore with drivers -- what most people try to avoid in buying a Mac. The construction, battery life, and screen quality are all very good. I don't like the keyboard, but then, I don't like the basic chiclet style of keyboard that is taking over the industry and is shared with every single ultrabook out there.
Both the HP Folio and Samsung Series 9 are available with both i5 and i3 processors; I'd avoid the i3, if possible. I'd expect the $600ish systems to be i3s, but you might find a deal on an i5.
Probably out of budget at around $1000, but the Asus UX21 (11.6" ultrabook) looks like one of the sweetest travel notebooks out there, and has a ULV i5.
How large are the LaTeX documents you're working with? How heavily graphical? Book-length stuff (eg a PhD dissertation) are going to be a lot more painful on a low end processor than 10-12 page papers.
I would be working on a ~100 page book chapter with about 20 figures and about 100 equations.
I am looking at a i5. There was a deal today on Samsung series 9 today at Microsoft Store for $700+free Xbox. Hopefully something similar will be repeated. I liked UX21 but as you mentioned it is out of budget. There is a Toshiba Portege Z835 for around 700. Reviews seem to be mixed.