Of course, you can build your own laptop with quite a bit of poking around, but I would not really suggest it lest you know what you are doing. I have seen laptops get built for less than half of what their marketed brethren go for.


Anyways, I have had nothing but good luck with dell; I mean, if something breaks, they are on it. You need some patience in dealing with their reps, unless you have the Gold Support (us based help desk etc), I have a nice Core Duo laptop with 17 inch screen and all the bells and whistles, and the thing has yet o hit a hardware problem. Well built and fast imo. It is my laptop for work though, thus it needing to be dell. I do support the product, though personally I may look at custom enclosures; but that certainly does not mean I do not support what dell can do. They are an amazing company.

After saying all that, I would go Dell, in your position. Something a little heftier should fall in your price line - especially if you look into the refurbished lines.