Selecting a laptop

[AppaBalwant]

Hello experts,
I am trying to select a laptop for my niece who is a chess player. What I am looking for is decent computing power without great graphics abilities. All the configurations that I am coming across are 'gaming laptops' with high end graphic capabilities which I do not really want. My budget is about 1500$ to 1800$.
Please redirect this if this is not the right forum to ask.
Thanks

[camerongray]

You will need to find more about what she uses the machine for.  There is no point spending that much on a machine if she will never use the power available.

[AppaBalwant]

She uses the machine for analysis of the moves. At present, her machine (Core 2 duo with 4GB RAM) takes anywhere between 15 to 60 minutes to come up with the results.

[camerongray]

If the issue is with the CPU then just focus on getting the best CPU possible, ideally an Intel Core i7 4xxxQM as this would be a quad core i7.  If you are only seeing ones for gaming, look cheaper.

Also look into the software she is using, it could just be really old/inefficient and may not benefit from a newer CPU.

[AppaBalwant]

@camerongray, I have ruled out the software issue. It is up to date. I was looking for something with Core i7 processor, 6MB cache with 16GB RAM (something like Dell Alienware 17. But, it has impressive graphics capabilities which I don't require and probably those graphic features are adding a lot to the cost).

[AppaBalwant]

@camerongray, My niece is close to becoming a Grand Master now and she needs a lot of computing power.
I am trying to zero in on one of these:
Lenovo ThinkPad W540 or Dell Inspiron 17
Will compare the specifications carefully.
Tell me if you have something to suggest.
Thanks for your response ...

[camerongray]

Lenovo ThinkPads are brilliant laptops as they are proper business grade machines so are very well made and have good support such as long onsite warranties (I have the ThinkPad T440s myself and have owned 3 X series and an L series in the past).  The W series are pretty expensive so you may want to look at something from the T series such as the T440p/T540p.

I can also highly recommend getting the Full HD IPS screen options and their extended batteries, my T440s can get 11 hours off of a single charge if I am fairly sensible with it.

The Inspiron is a good machine as well but is targeted at the average consumer, not the same quality level as a ThinkPad.