I've definitely had horror experiences with Dell, so stay the hell away from them! I have two HP's (well, one is my Dad's, but I use it when I'm home, and I have a Compaq laptop), and they're absolutely unbelievable, and SO CHEAP. So that's my rec. (though the DVD-RW drive on my laptop just died, and I've only had it for a year and a half, but still - for the specs on that thing, I saved like $500 off any other company, and everything else works great, so I can deal)