I have a Dell and really like it. My son has a custom-made one that he swears by. I hope someone can come along and give you comparisons. Mine was around $800 and my son's was around $1,200. We have had them two years and they are still perking along.

I have a Dell that I paid $1,200 for. But I understand Wal-Mart carries Dell now and you can get one for around $399.

Stacy,

All of the desktop support techs at work swear by Dell computers. And, you can go to the Dell website and create a "designer" laptop -- check it out.

Here is a link that might be useful: Dell Design Studio

I know there are diamonds and lemons among every brand, so I can only relate MY experience.

My $1,500 Dell lasted one year + one week until it died. If you buy a Dell, get the extended warranty!

I have an Acer now but only use it for a back up or when we travel.

I have a red Dell laptop. I like it, but have had the service man here 2 times with it. I got it in April. It suddenly started giving me the message that I needed to get the correct adapter. I was using the one that came with it. After doing some research I found out that many Dell users had this problem and had to have a service man put in a new service board. The guy came out and replaced mine and it worked fine. Then I found out the DVD/CD drive didn't work, so another service man came out and replaced it for me. No cost to me either time.
I love the RED!

With my experience the three top laptops (notebooks, actually) are, in no particular order, Toshiba, IBM and Apple. Apple of course is much more expensive. Toshiba is by far the best value out there for quality and price. IBMs are pricy too.

I avoid Dell, Gateway and Compaq like the plague. HP has improved since they're trying to put their notebooks back at a higher level now that they took over Compaq, they leave the Compaq as the low-buck line.

Dell has gone back to having different levels so if you want to spend a lot more to get something with a Dell name you can get something decent. I just can't justify to most of my clients to spend the money when they can get far better value with a Toshiba. I have two and couldn't be more pleased. The one is a year old and the other is about 6 years old with hard use.

Desktops can't be compared to notebooks. I still far prefer a custom built desktop from a competent builder over any of the mass-produced junkboxes. The cost isn't much more but the value is far more.

All that said, even the lower quality units can be OK if you take proper care of them.

I just bought my son a Dell for graduation and we both really love it. It was about $775 that was adding some Microsoft Word program to it and also some deal they were having on a printer.

Now after buying it, I talked to my computer tech and he told me I should have talked to him first. lol He apparently is not a Dell fan. I have always bought Dell and never had an ounce of trouble. Anyway, this is what he said:

Buy a Toshiba Satellite or Satellite Pro. I bought an Inspirion 15 with Intel Pentium Dual Core T4200 (2.0 GHz/800Mhz). He said I should have had 1600 Mhz.

Memory: I bought 3GB (he said I should have 4GB) Shared Dual Channel DDR2 at 800MHz (he said should be 1600 MHz).

I bought 250GB SATA Hard Drive (5400 RPM). He said should be 320 GB.

Video Card: I bought Intel Graphics Media Accelerator. He said I should have gotten Invidea or ATI.

Anyway I know that is A LOT of specifics. lol But when I was buying our laptap, I wanted to know specifics and had a hard time finding them.

Hope this helps.

I have a Toshiba , paid on sale just a little over 575.00...love it.. my son is an IT person and he said to stay away from Dell.. from his experience too many problems.

I like IBM's. They're not flashy, but they're durable workhorses. I buy them used on Ebay, and buy the extended warranty from Square Trade.

Last month, for example, I bought an IBM T60 for $325, plus a 2-year extended warranty for another $56.

There are lots of Ebay sellers who buy computers from business that retire them after 2-3 years, then refurbish and sell on Ebay.

My daughters both have Apple laptops, they use for college work. Thet were expensive- about $1200 each.

I recently got an HP dv6 (or something like that) to use as my main computer. I do lots of photo editing so I needed a larger screen and faster model. DH got a hold of my research and ordered it behind my back! So far so good. It was under $1000, had an upgraded hard drive and RAM at no extra charge. IT guys here at work recommended it.
Also got a wireless broadband card from Sprint and they really messed up my account - four hours later I finally got my phone service back... two hours later I got caller ID and voice mail back. Their customer service was terrible.

I too recommend a Dell. I've had my desktop 5 1/2 years and because of buying the extended warranty, have never had any repair charges.

.why well you all know how I keep messing his up not on purpose.
I mess this up too, and Dell either helps me get it straightened, or else we empty it out and reload the Operating System and everything is just like new. Since I bought the extended warranty and extended it for a total of 5 years, Dell will give me free technical support for the life of the computer.

Well with Sydney going to college, getting the boys back to school I am looking at only 500 and under...so will go with the dell I guess....i just can't justify buying one thath I would love I nkow when we have so many expesives witht the kids riht now....but at lest it would get em off of Brians laptop which is totatlly makeing me nervous...stacy

The guy in Brians office who cringes looked for me (he knows what all i do on them and said this would be great for me and 500! So hopefully I will own one wednesday! Stacy

Here is a link that might be useful: Dell