I want to say positive things about Apple and their Macbooks but I'm afraid you all beat me up when I'm just strolling around in off-topic and nobody can hear me scream.... :(

You can say all the positive things you want, but it still doesn't change the fact that the Mac itself is pretty expensive for what you get.

The only exception would be the ipad, where there really isn't any competition in the tablet market to gauge it against.

All I can say here is that I love my Macbook Pro. It's extremely durable, got great battery life, great performance and OS X is a cool operating system. Windows also runs perfectly on it (although I don't need it often). I've had countless people saying "Macs are stupid. Why did you buy this?" But the ones who had some time with it all said it was way better than they ecpected. If all you want is performance a Macbook is not for you (even though they do have great specs). But the overall package is just killer. Basically the longer you use a Mac the more you get used to this "it just works" thing. You do have to pay quite a hefty price for it, though. But the biggest mistake most people do when they buy notebooks is just looking for the specs. There are things way more important for your daily user experience than the pure specs. (In my case being virus-free, having a magnetic power adapter, a backlit keyboard and a operating system that fits me well improved the experience the most.)

Just take your time and make sure you spend your money on the things you really need and not on things you won't need

I'm not sure how much I'm adding to the discussion but, I would go with HP. I've really never had a problem with their laptops. But ideally, you want to take off all the crap that comes pre-installed that you don't need.

Also, can you ship me your old laptop?

have you seen the M11x is real life. while yes it has good battery life the dam thing is HUGE. its about as larger than regular 15" laptops. And its weighs alot. I was thinking of getting one before i saw it in real life and was DAM. 

the Alienware laptops are more like an desktop replacement and if you are taking it anywhere you cant use it while on the bus or train and stuff. 

Since all the big name brands outsource different models to various contract manufacturers, you have to look at the reputation of specific models to select a good, reliable laptop. Customer reviews helped me in the past to avoid lemons, but it takes some time to find them and read them to figure out if this particular laptop is for you.

I had to do it so many times in the past, that I ended up developing software to help with this task. You can quickly check reputation of many products if you go to http://www.amplifiedanalytics.com/V2P-Product-Reviews/Demo, start entering the product name or number like "Asus ... or "Toshiba Laptop", see if you find a model on the list you are interested in, and click on "Submit" button. The system will aggregate and analyze customer reviews to calculate the reputation metrics for you and will let you read the reviews if you want to.

The list is updated from time to time, so let me know if you can't find the product you want to check.

Over heating and sparse battery life are valid complaints for Toshiba.  For some people these aren't a huge concerns though. College students are likely going to have gobs of access to power outlets. The inevitable hour, hour and a half worn battery life to some is a mute point.  If you have a warranty, the retailer or toshiba(whichever you have the warranty through) should replace it before it is unbearable.   For the overheating, as long as the fan has room to breath it should be fine.  Times when I've overheated, I was running a heavy operation while not giving the fan some room.  Most importantly, neither of these two problems are detrimental to the health of the laptop.

For my situation, Toshiba has been excellent given the price, power, and reliability.

I was seriously considering an Alienware, but settled with a gaming laptop from Gateway. I did my homework beforehand.

Source: http://www.gateway.com/gaming/pseries.php

Gateway laptops are some of the most reliable out there. Toshiba laptops are highly desired, but run hot and break down fairly quickly as noted in the customer reviews at BestBuy.com. Alienware...You are buying the brand name, which has been tarnished ever since they sold out to Dell. As for HP, I could not tell you but they are getting mighty trendy. Sony is nice, but too generic.

Core 2 Duo? Really? There's been three generations of Intel CPUs since then.

Now that's just being nice.

As a brand, I can recommend Acer. I have an Acer i7 laptop for almost 4 months now, and it has been very short of perfect (battery life sucks, he's not kidding).