the lenovo and msi look sweet..never heard of lenovo though...
this is for my cousin, he is computer illiterate, im pretty much just looking for the most bang for the buck. cheaper the better but i dont see him buying a new laptop anytime soon so just something where the technology will be able to keep up in 3-4 years. As for gaming, i dont see him playing more than a flash game online.
in regards to hdmi or s-video, i connect my laptop to my tv using s-video sometimes, it just seems like a cool thing to have.