If you don't mind the size, you won't be dissapointed by Sager. They have the best bang for the buck, and by far the best construction. Built like a russian tank. Big, heavy, hot, powerful, indestructible. IIRC, Sager and Alienware use many of the same internal frame structures, they only have different skins. Several of my friends have Sagers and are VERY happy with them.
Dells are OK, but they're middle of the road, IMHO. Still way better than the crappy HP or Compaq notebooks you'll find in Walmart or at BestBuy. If you go Dell, make sure to get a high end Inspiron, and get it with a real GPU, not the slooow integrated graphics.
There are only 2 or 3 companies that manufacture laptops for the hundreds of companies that brand and sell the things. Sure, they're made to specs, so even though your neighbor's Dell and your dentist's MacBook might be made by the same company, they are very different machines inside. But the overall quality control is pretty similar. Laptops aren't perfect, they're all a little fragile in one way or another. And they're all a pain to work on if you need to go beyond the parts that are under the easy-access hatches. Still, laptops are sure handy.
I personally still love Thinkpads and PowerBooks/MacBooks. Many of us in my department just bought MacBooks. When you look at all of the features, innovations, the size, and the bundled software (and now the ability to dual boot into Windows), the MacBook was a downright bargain, especially at our academic price of $1849 for the base model upgraded to 1gig ram.
IMHO, the average home computer builder would be happiest with Sager. They're big, a little easier to work on, and pack a lot of bang for the buck.