My last computer was a Gateway. Good machine - but I got it back in '93, and I never needed their tech support (being a CS major
)
My current machine is a Winbook laptop. Again, good machine, but it's about 5 years old and the LCD is cracked. (That's what I get for closing it too hard
It's not too sturdy)
At work, I use a Dell running NT for email and web surfing, and a Sun workstation running Solaris to connect to our web servers. Unix rocks.
If I were you, and if you don't want to mess with getting parts and building from scratch, I'd get a Dell. Especially if you want a laptop. At my last job they gave me a Dell laptop - it survived just about anything
If your hard-drive data is critical, and you're willing to spend some $$$, there are places that can recover your data for you. But it's pretty pricey. If the only copy of your thesis is on there, I'd do it, otherwise - probably not worth it.