I am about to get rid of a laptop that has truly been a nightmare almost since day one. They also did not honor their warranty. I am talking about an HP.
I am looking for responses for the following questions (answer all or just some):

1. What company do you think makes the best laptops and why?

2. Is there a model in particular that is CURRENTLY for sale that you would recommend to someone who is looking for a reliable computer but only uses it for the basics? (However, due to having pictures of family, I would like to have at least 80 gigs of memory) Please use a complete model number.
Forgot to mention that I am on a budget and it needs to be under $1k

3. What company (if any) does NOT outsource its customer service agents? (meaning I want to speak with customer service in the USA if there is a problem or question in the future)

4. What company stands by their products with their warranty? (mine called everything "customer damage" even though it wasn't)

5. I am thinking about buying a Toshiba. Your thoughts on that company?

Thanks so much.

Thread moved to correct forum.

1. IBM / Lenono. Build quality.
2. T60 with integrated graphics or an R60.
3. I don't know. This is a tough one, as just about any big company that reaches a certain size outsources. It annoys me just as much as you. When my cable breaks down I have to phone this number and I wind up getting put on hold for ages, then some guy from India who can't seem to speak English properly comes on and says "Just a moment sir" a lot and then puts me back on hold. Makes my blood boil.

4. That's hard to say too. Its definately the case that companies are a lot less on the side of the consumer now. Instead of trying to help you / go the extra mile they seem instead to want to leave you with a broken laptop, as if this is somehow a victory for them. My advice is to go for as budget model, if it breaks down buy something new as opposed to messing around trying to get it fixed.

5. Never owned a Toshiba laptop. If in doubt, try reading a review on your prospective model here:

http://www.notebookreview.com/reviews/

I have the Toshiba mx35-s161 and am very satisfied with it.
Comes with WiFi, 60gb hd and 512mb ram ...
it's a Celeron M processor at 1.3ghz -- fine for me.

sole 'wish' would be for longer battery time.

I pretty much agree with what Phantasm said. Although on question number 5, I can't say anything good about Tosiba laptops. Have had numerous issues with bad keyboards and overheating problems in the last 3 that I had. We even had issues with the ones we used at work. We got rid of them and went to ThinkPads. I think you should figure out your budget and then read reviews on machines in that range. But I think you will be hard pressed to find anything better than the ThinkPad's. Just my .02

like jobeard, I also own a toshiba. Same issue - battery life. But I seldom run on batteries anyway. I also upgraded the ram and hard drive. I have had it for 3 years and it does everything I need it to do - even in combat.

They all of some sort of battery life problems.. Older Toshiba Tecra 8000 and up series were very stable. Some of these newer ones give problems unless you shell out more bucks for Quallity..

DELL you can forget... Older C600 did last but now if you had one would start to become faulty. D600 one of the worst ones with DOA, faulty MOBO and number of issues, battery is awful. C620 is new and C820 but users have complained about drivers issues and weird sound beeping problems. Stem to be wrong drivers loaded. Some HP/Compaq are so stable but they're hard to find. The market is flooded with so many laptops.

IBM doesn't make laptops anymore, I would stay clear for a couple of reasons since being in the repair business and a couple of other areas. But the last good IBM was the T41 series the T43 was faulty.. Some ACER is even better to buy..

Know what you want before you buy and features, don't get anything less than 1GB of RAM and 160GB HDD plus DVD-RW DL and a 12 Cell Battery.

I owned a Toshiba before my wife spelled H2o on it. My home owners policy covered it and so I bought a T60P ThinkPad. I must tell you that they are two worlds apart as far as quality. The T60Ps back screen is Redhat and main is XP Pro.
I took the Toshiba apart and thats all that I needed to see. Not user servicable with exception to ram,HD, and rom drive. The T60P is 95% user servicable. Go to their web sight and you can download sevice and maint manuals. You can pretty much upgrade to your hearts desire on the T60P. Yes the IBM ThinkPad is owned and built in Hong Kong but I must say that the quality is still the same as it was when IBM owned it and it has not suffered.