bit out of the loop on what is currently hot in the world of laptops, but the first step would be to decide what uses you want it for. just general netsurfing or video and you could pick up a solid netbook for a few hundred.
when i was last looking a few years back, 400-500 could get a fairly meh but still decent laptop...just depends on the functions you want.
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There is no shame in not knowing; the shame lies in not finding out