Does anyone know of a pretty good hotel in austin close to UT (not a ratty one please)?

there is a double tree close to UT. its a really nice hotel, not to overly expensive though.

try going to starwoodhotels.com They have beautiful rooms with decent rates. For examle when I went to chicago I had a 2 rm. suite with 2 dbl beds, and a single love seat hide a bed for 89.00 per night. (not to mention the spa and pool)

There's a Days Inn across the freeway, but I don't know if you consider that ratty. If you head towards downtown there's a Double Tree Hotel and I think a Holiday Inn Express or something. There are some nice hotels around 15th street and Guadalupe, and they're not too too expensive.

How close are you looking to be? I'd go on Expedia and use the hotel-search feature for "Near an Address." For the address you want to search by, you could use 1900 Guadalupe, 2300 Guadalupe - those are both right at or across from the campus. Lots of nice hotels downtown within a short drive -- Downtown is very close to UT. There's a Radisson downtown at Cesar Chavez, right on the lake, there's a Doubletree that I think is maybe even closer to campus. On South Congress there's the San Jose which is very cute and funky but it's a little further away - no problem if you've got a car though. There's some fancy mansion that they've turned into a hotel that's on I think Martin Luther King, close to the campus, if you have tons of money. If you won't have a car you should search online for the schedule for the "Dillo" bus. I know some of the Dillos go from the downtown area a few blocks north of the Radisson (safe walk on a main street) to the UT area. I think they're either free or 50 cents and they're quite pleasant, as buses go.