Sorry to hear of your loss man... if its really mobo problem, replacing one will at least cost Rm1k! 

A notebook for designing/drawing will benefit from a decent CPU and lots of RAM:
14"
Lenovo
Z480, i5-3230M + Nvidia GT640M@RM1999, 4GB, 1TB(5400rpm) W8, colors: grey/red/blue
G400s, i5-3230M + Nvidia GT720M@RM1899, 4GB, 1TB, W8

Toshiba
Satellite L840-1056X/XR/XW, i5-3230M + AMD HD7670M@RM1999, 2GB, 500GB, W8SL; 2 years warranty; colors: black/red/white
Satellite M840-1070XR/XW, i5-3230M + AMD HD7670M@RM1999, 2GB, 500GB, W8SL; 2 years local warranty; colors:red/white

*Prices in RRP, negotiable
*Can also look for other models with i5-32XXM as well
**Please do take note that I am recommending notebooks with "older" specs. Even so, this models have "Mobile" processors which provide more CPU juice than the newer ULV processors  At least until the "Mobile" Haswell processor-powered notebooks become more common. If you want, you can wait
*Upgrade RAM to 8GB (at least 4GB; higher better)

Sorry to hear of your loss man... if its really mobo problem, replacing one will at least cost Rm1k! 

A notebook for designing/drawing will benefit from a decent CPU and lots of RAM:
14"
Lenovo
Z480, i5-3230M + Nvidia GT640M@RM1999, 4GB, 1TB(5400rpm) W8, colors: grey/red/blue
G400s, i5-3230M + Nvidia GT720M@RM1899, 4GB, 1TB, W8

Toshiba
Satellite L840-1056X/XR/XW, i5-3230M + AMD HD7670M@RM1999, 2GB, 500GB, W8SL; 2 years warranty; colors: black/red/white
Satellite M840-1070XR/XW, i5-3230M + AMD HD7670M@RM1999, 2GB, 500GB, W8SL; 2 years local warranty; colors:red/white

*Prices in RRP, negotiable
*Can also look for other models with i5-32XXM as well
**Please do take note that I am recommending notebooks with "older" specs. Even so, this models have "Mobile" processors which provide more CPU juice than the newer ULV processors  At least until the "Mobile" Haswell processor-powered notebooks become more common. If you want, you can wait
*Upgrade RAM to 8GB (at least 4GB; higher better)

G400s already recommended? haha
G500S can be consider as well But do take note that its FreeDOS ya:
15.6"
Lenovo
G500S, i3-3110M + Nvidia GT720M@RM1499, 2GB, 500GB, FreeDOS
G500S, i5-3230M + Nvidia GT720M@RM1699, 4GB, 500GB, FreeDOS
The S410p variants are powered by ULV processors, which are no match for the Mobile processors recommended in terms of performance 

FreeDOS, in layman's term, means no Microsoft Windows. You will have to install yourself. Not recommended if you are not familiar with it 

U410 has weak WiFi problems, and its a really old unit. Same goes to the A55VD Avoid!

So pretty much the Asus 550CC 

Already remmended to you what?
My recommendations still stand.
Since you are not into gaming, the graphic card doesn't matter much
Having a Mobile GPU i.e. i5 for your budget, and lots of RAM, on the other hand, will help 

i5 M (Mobile) is more powerful than i5 U (Ultra Low Voltage) processors.
Benchmarks here: http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Proces...ist.2436.0.html

Will come in handy for photo editing 

i5 M (Mobile) is more powerful than i5 U (Ultra Low Voltage) processors.
Benchmarks here: http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Proces...ist.2436.0.html

Will come in handy for photo editing 

Yeah, that one definitely can consider now that your budget is higher 
Try to look for the non-touch version since its cheaper ya 

+1, it has Nvidia Optimus to switch in between the iGPU and dGPU depending on need (performance or battery saving) 
Thanks for the input 

Yup~ That one is without touchscreen 

Aiyo, trust us la bro  When you buy, just make sure  you check the specs properly (though you won't get it wrong also apart from the Touchscreen/non-touchscreen, since the specs are fixed already lol
You are not the 1st one we recommended this notebook lol, and definitely not the last 

Manufacturer websites are known to be slow in updates, and inaccurate, apart from those which sells online

Definitely the Z500 since it runs on a Mobile processor
You might want to upgrade the RAM right away at the shop/COD since its not easy to upgrade yourself.
Can contact devour, he is very experienced with upgrading already iinm haha

Tawau? Lovely place, good seafood 
Grats on your purchase man
Windows 8 comes with Windows Defender (Microsoft Security Live Essentials), which is pretty good already haha, can just stick to that one when your 3 years of Mcafee runs out 

uninstall the Mcafee AV

Yeah, it will be a bit faster if you disable bloatwares that run during startup
And the "sluggishness" is because its running on a standard 5400rpm HDD, which is the slowest 

if you have softwares like CCcleaner (for simpleness) you can disable it.

if you are willing to spend a little more penny, you can choose a SSD.
the performance of a SSD is you will never forget its fastness.

sure, why not?
just FYI, if you want to hard drive bays, you need to buy a caddy drive for the Z500 but will sacrifice your DVD-RW drive though.