Unless you need massive GPU power, I’d probably get a larger laptop with a quad-core i7 and dedicated GPU, connect it to a nice screen, keyboard, and mouse— that way you get essentially desktop-style performance and such but portability when you occasionally need it. Then for portable computing (class notes, etc.), a Surface of some sort.
I have an HP Envy 15 (quad-i7, ATI 5830, dual-SSDs, etc.- slightly older but still great performance) plugged into a 27" 2560×1440 IPS panel (picked up for $399 from MicroCenter), MS Natural keyboard, mouse, and Logitech C920 HD webcam as my dorm “desktop.” For class, used to take along my Asus Zenbook ultrabook (Sandy Bridge i7), but the Surface RT has basically replaced it (so light, pretty much fully-featured Office, and all-day battery life).
No leaked roadmaps yet, but I’d imagine Surface Pro 2 will prob be out sometime in Q4, not as late as last time around. But depending on what your in-class needs will be, might want to take a look at the RT2- the ARM will still run rings around Haswell in battery life, heat, etc. (though obv big performance gap, and Atom Win8 tablets have basically matched ARM on the power front, but unclear if MS will do an Atom machine in the middle).
