Who ever said a laptop has to be expensive to be powerful? My Inspiron 3500 clocks at 300Mhz on its Pentium II Processor, with MMX, and delivers speed when you need it most. And with 128MB of RAM, you can run Windows, the Internet, an MP3, Virus Scan, and some other programs without it slowing down at all.
Storage is no problem with a 6.4 Gigabyte hard drive. The one draw back I noticed is that these machines only come with 2.5MB of video RAM. That is a VERY slight improvement on the 2MB of video RAM my Dell Optiplex has (which is 2 years older).
Overall, if you need a laptop for a good price, with some good options, I recommend the Dell Inspiron 3500 laptop, availible for $260 on eBay.com 3 years ago, when these babies were new, they ran for more than $2000, and these things still preform great for how old they are. Most definantly worth the $260. Enjoy!

Recommended: Yes

Amount Paid (US$): 260
Operating System: Windows
Processor: Intel Pentium II
Processor speed: 201-300
Screen Size: 14 inches
RAM: 128
Internal Storage: CD-ROM
Hard Drive (GB): 13-20