I picked up a new computer about a year ago when the HP laptop I had since '05 went belly-up for the third time (three hard drives in it's lifetime). It was replaced with an ASUS K52F which has been running fine. It has the Intel Core i3 processor on it.

I spoke to the guy at the counter with Best Buy where I bought it, and asked him which brands were the best to go with. He said the two brands they see the least of on repairs are Asus and Toshiba. The ones they see the most of are HP and Acer.

FWIW,

Phil