IMHO, for non-compute bound developers the single most important thing on a development machine is high resolution.
Both the Dell Latitude e6500 and the Lenovo Thinkpad T500/W500 are 15", high-end Core 2 Duo machines with WUXGA (1920x1200) screens. You can probably snag one on Ebay for $300-$400. Add in an SSD and max out the ram for another couple hundred dollars would be my suggestion.
That's the best developer machine short of a Retina MBP.
Both the Dell Latitude e6500 and the Lenovo Thinkpad T500/W500 are 15", high-end Core 2 Duo machines with WUXGA (1920x1200) screens. You can probably snag one on Ebay for $300-$400. Add in an SSD and max out the ram for another couple hundred dollars would be my suggestion.
That's the best developer machine short of a Retina MBP.
edit: updated Thinkpad models, added header.