Hardware Canucks - Laptop for School and lower-end gaming

Hey all,
I'm searching for a laptop to use mostly for school, but I want to be able to play games (WoW or Company of Heroes and such; I have a gaming rig at home if I want to play crysis) or movies if I want to, I was hoping for your thoughts.
I've narrowed it down to Asus laptops (unless someone can give me a really good reason to ignore their exceptional warranty), preferably 17"+ (I have large hands and I like big monitors). I'd also like to go for an nVidia optimus enabled laptop (the concept sounds great to me and saving power is always good).
My price range is about $1300 CAD or less.

What I'm looking at currently is the N90SC-A1 because its specs are just pretty. My main concern is the battery life. I don't want to have to get up every 30 minutes to plug the thing in, but I don't want to sacrifice too much in the way of performance (I don't intend to be away from power for too long, but it would be nice to walk away from power if I wanted to).

What are people's experiences with the N series battery life?
Would you recommend another laptop over this one, why?

Thanks for your time!