Computer advice?

[badgercat]

I have a Dell Inspiron laptop that I used during most of my undergrad (2005-2008) ,which still runs fine, though I use it very infrequently since a new laptop was my graduation/heading off to grad school present from my family. I got a MacBook, but that's not really relevant--I'm not going to try to convert anyone here. They're darned expensive, and while I love my Mac, if it died tomorrow I'd probably replace it with a PC for sheer affordability.

Anyway, my mom got a new Dell laptop a couple years ago, and it had problems right out of the box. Spontaneously trying to eject CDs that weren't there, adjusting the volume all on its own, etc. I think Dells just aren't made like they used to be. *waves cane in air*

I have an Asus netbook that I got a little over a year ago because I was tired of hauling my MacBook around campus every day (and stressed that my primary computer was spending so much time outside of my house, perched on narrow classroom desks, etc). I run Win7 on it and have been quite happy with it, but I can't speak to what Asus's "full-sized" machines are like.