The Intel Centrino platform has received rave reviews from many different places. A Centrino-branded laptop is a pretty safe bet to be a solid machine. There's been some criticism on the components, such as lack of PCI-Ex bus, lack of DDR, poor memory performance, et cetera. A few of these issues were addressed with the release of the newer Intel chipsets which provided 533mhz FSB support in notebooks for Pentium Ms and onboard PCI-Ex. The older chipsets are still the most common, however. Intel has put a halt to production on these and will cease taking orders for them this year. They have already done this for the 400mhz FSB Pentium M's, but the older chipsets only support 400mhz FSB and thus must be phased out as well. Although they are still selling well, it is a good way for Intel to push the next advancement for "Centrino" branded machines. Check the full details here