Why would you ever recommend a high end 15" laptop to average people in the first place. I'd agree with the other commenter that recommends a new tech guy for your friends.
Why? I don't know... maybe it has to do with not wanting to buy a shit laptop at bestbuy/costco and calling it a day. Anyone can do that, and a lot of my friends ask a very specific question: "Dude, I want a good laptop that will last a few years without breaking like the POS stuff I usually buy for $500 at Costco... what do you recommend?" I would say, head to our local Apple store. I am no longer going to say that.
Are they throwing their laptops down a flight of stairs on a regular basis? What exactly is breaking? My Dad is still rocking a 4 year old "POS $500 Costco laptop" and it runs as well as it did the day I bought it.
I added an SSD and upgraded the memory to 8GB and it's more than fast enough for everything the normal person would do outside of kids that are trying to game (in which case you shouldn't be buying a laptop anyway).
