My laptops...

I recently purchased a Dell Inspiron 600m and like it. It has a 14" screen but is high resolution (1400 x 1050) which allows you to see a LOT of the screen. Since I travel between home and various clients sites for my work, I wanted something small and light-weight. Two laptops ago, I owned the HP zd7000 monster with a desktop Pentium 4 CPU, 10240MB RAM (purchased from 1-800-4-Memory) and a 80GB HD. While the processor was fast, the 4200 RPM drive really slowed the system down, not to mention the 10 lbs that it weighed. It was alright when I was more stationary between one client and home, but became much more difficult to move when I had to run between multiple clients. Then there was the fact that it required so much power that I couldn't use it in the car with the power outlet since it required so much juice! I ended up selling it to a friend in May 2004. My next laptop was a Apple 12" PowerBook revision "c", which was a VERY nice system. The build quality was extremely high and the keyboard responded so very well. I've owned two iMac systems before and was also disappointed by their performance. This system had a G4 1.33GHz CPU and a 5400 RPM hard drive. I felt it was really snappy and didn't mind that speed at all. I really liked the system but ended up selling it. Why did I sell it? QuickBooks for the Mac has a long ways to go, the printing support is Mac OS X stinks, at least with the network printers I was trying connect to, and the ethernet/airport connection over my home LAN/wireless network was very sporadic. My downloads would stall, no matter what browser or FTP client I was using, and it was extremely annoying. Many Google searches and calls to Apple yielded no fruitful results. I was also disappointed by the Apple technical support. I was new to Macs, but I'm pretty sure that I knew more then these guys did as I ended up answering all of my own questions. In the end, the PowerBook was sold on eBay for the Dell 600M which was purchased with a nice 20% off coupon! If I were to compare the build quality of the Dell to the Apple there would be no contest, the Apple was world's better then the Dell. The first 600m I received had a dead pixel, which really didn't bother me as you had to know where to look to see it and I often forgot about it. The keyboard was very "soft" and I didn't like that. The unit also seemed "slanted", like the right palm rest wasn't "snapped" together all the way. The battery in the compartment under the unit was also loose and was annoying that it would slide just a little when I would grab the laptop just right. I called Dell about it and they sent me a new one within two days with the exact same configuration. Why it took them ten days to build my first one and I had a second in two days is somewhat humorous to me, but I was happy to get it so quickly. Except for the dead pixel from the first one, this second one exhibited the same build quality problems. I thought about throwing the towel in on the 600m altogether, but it was purchased at a very reasonable price and I was just plain tired from changing laptops so much. I had also purchased a 2 year warranty which includes CompleteCare or accident protection. This means if, or when, I spill something on it or drop it, they will repair/replace the unit. That was one thing I couldn't have with the Apple was accident protection, not that I'm a klutz, but it cost a lot of money and it was a risk with being as mobile as I was. Guess I like a safety net. Will I ever own another Apple? Sure, but most likely an eMac as it's cheap and I can still get the SuperDrive to do some iMovie/iDVD stuff.