a few comments / questions about the laptop:
1) how much do you know about computers? i ask because you could buy a laptop without an operating system installed (which saves hella money). if you WANT Vista, you should reconsider, but if you get it w/o operating system and have a copy of XP you could use or whatever you use, you'd save money. if you want help on how you could do this, let me know.
2) are you running your laptop into a monitor? are you only using it when you're traveling? when are you using it? i don't know what size screen you want, hard drive size, RAM, etc, because if you're only using it when traveling you could probably get a really cheap one that'd be WAY MORE than fine for your purposes, but it'd have probably 13 inch screen, not as powerful, whatever. and if you're plugging it into monitor, it doesn't matter what size screen is obv. but if you're going to use it pretty often, that'll change some of what you may want in it.
Hewlett Packard Compaq 6710B - $649 (probably can find cheaper)
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-...ok.4457.0.html
Hewlett Packard Compaq Presario V5000Z - $549
http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/hp-c....html?tag=prod
best (essentially) bare bones laptop with the best base price you'll find on any laptop. have used one personally, it was definitely more than $549 worth of machine, and for poker you definitely don't need more than this. this is probably best bet, unless your uses for it extend past what you've said.
in all seriousness though, if you're interested in talking about getting a macbook pro, or at least would entertain hearing an argument in favor of doing so, let me know. you're paying $2,000 for a mac (infinitely better than XP, LIGHT YEARS ahead of Vista), the macbook pro is the FASTEST VISTA LAPTOP, which is really lol, but obviously you can run XP/Vista when you need to or are playing, and i think if you haven't really used it much you'll like mac os x a LOT, especially leopard. again, don't know how computer-savvy you are, but we can talk if you want. PM me if you have questions.