Best cheap laptop for running Second Life & SAM 4?

I have a budget of $500 USD. I want something that will play phoenix viewer and V2 of secondlife, and also be able to handle my classwork (I'm a web design major in college) and SAM 4. I need a long battery life, preferably a long life in general. I also HAVE something with good customer service. I don't care if it's plain, or big or small as long as it has space to also handle my secondlife photography things (I use picnik, photoscape and gimp). I am aware that the secondlife specifications aren't that demanding but it's important to me to be able to run it AND sam since I DJ there. I would prefer not having to have a compaq or HP, as those brands I've had awful experience with, as well as Dell and gateway. I've heard good and bad about ASUS and Toshiba, but I'm still unsure and i don't trust the salespeople to tell me the truth since the last place i went sold me a laptop that started failing the day after i bought it and burned out a year later when the motherboard melted (HP).