I doubt that many are poor nowadays - it's such a competitive market that the prices tend to be pretty consistent, and the quality very uniform.
Lenovo - they who used to manufacture for IBM, have an excellent reputation, I doubt you'd go wrong.
I happen to get a good deal on Toshibas, so am on my second. Currenly a Portege because I like the long battery life and light weight, don't mind the smallish screen, and didn't want to compromise on computing power. Like my previous Toshiba (which is now running very happy with my brother 5+ years after I bought it) it's flawlessly reliable.
Things I'd personally look at when buying a laptop:
- Average score on Amazon !
- Battery life, and availability of a spare battery
- Weight
- Does it have a card slot?
- Can I turn the touchpad off ? (mine has a button to do this, which is really useful when I'm doing a lot of typing on public transport!
- How's the screen?
- I'd not buy a seriously underpowered netbook (which most of them are).
- Lots of USB ports, ability to drive external screen(s).
- How good are the speakers (I tend to watch DVDs when working away - it's the one thing however that Toshiba are really crap at, so I end up using headphones.)
G