I appreciate all the help I've received so far, it does appear I'm
going to have to live with what I've got but if any of you really want
to help, send me one of your old, discarded Acer Ferraris, OK? ;-)

There are so many GREAT deals on notebooks that meet all the specs I'd
want at very low prices but the fact remains that I use a laptop so
seldom that I can't justify spending any money at all on one. sigh