I'm going to nitpick at the requirements here.
Four hour plus battery life - Not a problem. Most non-gaming/high performance laptops achieve this on standard size 6-cells now.
Great feeling keyboard - Vague, define more parameters. You want chiclet style? Shorter/longer travel? Keyboard with numpad? -
Great keyboard means a tactile feel that requires more force to push down, usually traditional style although the newer Thinkpad and Macbook island keyboards still deliver that feel. I don't care for the numpad.Nub mouse in center of keyboard - This limits you to Dell, HP, Toshiba, Lenovo, and possibly Panasonic. And only to their business laptops (which may not have the $600 starting price) Nobody else (as far as I know) ships with nub mice anymore.
Minimal gloss inside and out - Glossiness has pretty much gone out of style as well, and business laptops never had it.
Smooth Flash(Youtube at max res, Flash games, and Flash development) - Define "smooth Flash" and "max res". You're also going to have to describe the content a little more. Any PC today can run old flash games from 2001. -
*Let's define this as smooth playback on Youtube at full screen at 720p.SSD inside or upgradable - SSD included not possible in this price range. $600 is the bare minimum for a non-crappy laptop. SSD upgrades tend to add $150+ on top of that. Most are upgradeable to one though, but accessibility to the insides may be a concern.
$600 US or lower - You're going to have to increase your budget for something decent.
Smooth enough for Photoshop and Premiere CS6 - May be possible given enough RAM and a processor with 4 virtual cores.
Windows 7 license - Aside from Apple, what
doesn't come with one? Unless you're looking for a specific version. Business laptops will ship with Professional, usually. -
I listed this because i wasn't necessarily expecting to buy new, and used laptops may come with XP or VistaPowerful enough for the occasional game of TF2 or CS GO at playable settings - An Intel HD3000 will make the cut. It'll have to be played at medium settings at 1280x720 though.
high res screen - Unless you're getting a 17", this comes as a premium of $100+
Instant ready from sleep - Most do this already.
The two biggest issues are:
- Requirement of a nub mouse. You limit your choices. I mean, if you're good with it with the programs listed, great, but again, you're limiting your options here. -I'm gonna stand firm on the requirement.
- Budget. $600 is just barely getting out of the, for lack of a better phrase, crap tier. Most laptops I've seen in this range for something recent (you might get lucky with a "lesser" brand) have a Core i3 with no dedicated GPU. If you want something that performs much better, you're going to have to up it to about $800.
Remember - Price, Speed, Quality. Pick two.
If I sell my current laptop, budget goes up to $750. Remember used model recommendations. Looking for nub mouse, good keyboard, and high battery life. Power should be enough for smooth web browsing, I'm not looking for a powerhouse.