I saw some stats from research done that shows Asus has the lowest laptop return rate in the past three years. I've heard similar things from different sources. Asus builds many laptops for gaming purposes, and supposedly desktops/laptops built for those purposes wind up being higher quality machines. (I guess that makes sense, though I don't claim to know much about the hardware manufacturing process).
Here's one I'm interested in (though the 4 GB max limit concerns me):
http://www.amazon.com/K70IC-A2-17-3-Inch-Versatile-Entertainment-Windows/dp/B002P3KMSU/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1262583037&sr=8-6I have a Gateway Quad-core desktop that was built for gaming purposes, and the machine is fantastic.
On the other hand, sometimes it's the old "YMMV"...most of my colleagues detest HP and find them to be crap - but my 2nd desktop (and an older laptop that I gave to my wife) are both HPs....several years old and have run with zero issues.
