Ok. My sister is about to graduate from high school and my parents are looking at getting her a laptop (I only got a cd burner when I graduated ), the only thing is, we can't really spend a fortune on this. We're looking at the low $1000 range as about the max.

We've somewhat got it narrowed down to 2 that we're looking at (both refurbished). One is a Sony VAIO FX300 and the other is a Gateway Solo 5300. I haven't really had any experience with either Sony or Gateway laptops, so if anyone has any comments, suggestions, warnings or whatever about these two machines, please let me know. Here are the basic specs for them:

Sony VAIO FX300:
<a href="http://www.sonystyle.com/computing/prd.jsp?model=PCG-FX300/14B" target="_blank">http://www.sonystyle.com/computing/prd.jsp?model=PCG-FX300/14B</a>

Pentium III 1 GHz
8x DVD-ROM drive
14.1" XGA (1024 x 768) TFT screen
128 MB RAM (expandable to 512 MB)
15 GB hard drive
10Base-T/100Base-TX NIC
AGP-enabled Intel 815EM graphics chip with up to 11 MB video SDRAM (shared)
Integrated V.90 modem
Win XP Home Edition

$1049.99

Gateway Solo 5300:
<a href="http://www.gateway.com/reman/hm_notebook_1006192_3003064_5300.asp?seg=hm" target="_blank">http://www.gateway.com/reman/hm_notebook_1006192_3003064_5300.asp?seg=hm</a>

900MHz Pentium III
14.1" TFT Active Matrix
128 MB RAM
Integrated Speakers and Integrated Sound
30GB Hard Drive
8X DVD-ROM
56K Integrated Modem
Integrated 10/100 Ethernet
Microsoft Windows 98 Second Edition

$879

If you would recommend something else, please let me know (we're kinda running out of time to get something), but I would really appreciate it. Thanks!