You had problems with wheels on a new bike??!!??

Either

- you weigh 9000000 kg and those low spoke count jobs just couldn't hack it
- you love gutter jumping, riding straight into potholes, etc
- you forgot to take the bike back to the LBS for a tune up after two weeks
- you got a really bad break and ended up with rims/spokes from a bad batch
- your missus/man/parents were sabotaging your bike

My two cents worth:

wheels are generally the component that gives you the least amount of problems on a bike once they have settled in and had a true after 500km.

$2000 bike? hmmm... you might be able to find a nice new Al frame with full Ultegra groupset in that price bracket, but the wheels will be on the cheaper end of the scale. For $2200+ you might even get carbon seat stays and seatpost.

I train on crap Alex DA-22 36 spoke wheels and race on crap Shimano 540's. No problems with either. For general riding/training look for 32 or 36 spokes and rim profile of 30mm or more for strength. Don't need to be anything flash, but a good set of spokes (eg DT Swiss stainless) are worth every cent.