This is probably your best bet. The only negative is that it is a bit on the heavier side at a little over 5 lbs. I own an Acer Aspire S7, and I manage to play TF2 on it. But, depending on the configuration you choose, it won't have the power the Y50 has.

It seems a bit overkill for just tf2, you could probably go cheaper with something like the asus X550JK, which has an 850m. Both would easily run tf2, and probably do ok with more intensive games as well.

I bought a lenovo y40 for uni a few months ago, the only reason I didn't get the y50 was because I built a gaming pc this summer plus 14 inch seems ideal for taking notes. Its a great laptop. The only thing I didn't like about the y40 was that it doesn't have a backlit keyboard but to my knowledge the y50 does... go get it.

I was considering the Lenovo Y50, but the reviews that I read said that it has a really terrible screen, so beware. I got the MSI GE60 instead on a discount (originally $1250 if I remember correctly) and I am so far happy with it. The only thing it really suffers from is the lack of an SSD (which you can install yourself if you are so inclined, I don't really mind so much to pay for the upgrade).

I can attest to the screen. My brother and sister both have variants of the y50 (one has an i7 and the other an i5), and on both the colours aren't that great. However, in terms of gaming, it seems to be one of the best for the price (at least in Canada I couldn't really find something similar in stock).

I got the y50 this summer and it runs tf2 perfectly fine. The screen isn't that great for a 1080p screen but isn't unbearable.

I got my sister this Y50 for as her college/ gaming/ etc machine. It was working great for a while, but the battery life is pretty terrible now, despite being only a few months old. The trackpad is also pretty finicky and straight-up doesn't work sometimes. When I see her over Thanksgiving break, I can tell you whether it's the machine or something she's doing if you'd like.

Is she constantly charging her laptop when she's not on the go? That usually ruins battery life.

I have the y40 from a 1.5 years ago (it has a backlit keyboard) I like the size for taking notes, and for gaming I mostly hook it to a monitor. The wireless card is toast (8$ external fix) and the trackpad is shit but it runs everything I throw at it. The battery is still pretty decent, but then again I think 3-4 hours is decent and im a scrub that leaves it charging so idk

Check for deals from Lenovo directly. I know it sounds odd, but they often have really great instant discounts that will be cheaper than Amazon. We bought one for ~150 bucks cheaper than amazon from a 3 day deal that we found. Also, check to see if your school is partnered with Lenovo. When I was at OU, they had 15% off the checkout price when you used your school ID on the website.

Yes, the track pad is really shitty as people have mentioned.

http://www.sagernotebook.com/index.php?page=category_browse&selected_cat=3

For a little more money, you can get a 120Hz laptop, (in Asus either the G750JH or G750JX). I hear it performs very well, but it is very big and pretty heavy

There are laptops recently out with 900-series GPUs, will give you the usual iteratively-improved heat/noise/perf over the 860m.

My brother had one of those issued when he went to RPI and he really likes it, but he says its a bit heavy and the track pad can be really clunky at times.