I bought a XPS 1530 Dell Laptop. It's Awsome because Dell is currently doing 0% Interest for 12 months on all XPS models. Plus its a 15' built for gaming and practical use too. I prefer 15' over 17' because its not as heavy (smaller battery) and easier to take while traveling. I am in the military and currently doing school too, so I got a discount. It has 3g of RAM, and a 8600 NVidia GT, its a 15' LCD HD Screen with an HDMI input/output built-in. It runs smooth, has a built in camera, finger print reader for security. I paid like $1100 for it, but is started at $999 (without discount) with 2g RAM and a 8500 NVidia, but I upgraded it.

They build it within 5 days and ship it to you via UPS/Fed-Ex. If you dont like Vista you could probably get it cheaper with XP. I used to bash Dell, until I got this laptop and MrMarc is right, Dell makes great laptops. Hope it helps but just hit their site, you can build it from the ground up, and save your builds for future look, its cool. Link provided.

http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/xpsnb_m1530?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&~ck=mn

Dell makes some awesome lappys, like mine!

People will tell you not to get a compaq because it is the outhouse of HP. HP owns them and anything that doesn't live up to HP "quality" gets compaq put on it. btw, I wouldn't get HP either, my friend went through 2 HP and 1 compaq computer in a 5 year period. He couldn't really complain though because his dad was buying them for him. Personally I would go with a Dell, if you have good credit, like the truth hurts said, you can pay over time with no interest. Gaming laptops aren't worth it because they take a beating and need replacing to often if you are going to be taking it places. That along with things sqrl said. Just get it for other things, focus on sturdy, light, and long battery life.

If gaming is your biggest concern, I would go with Dell. If anything else trumps it (meaning build quality, portability, power to cost ratio, features), I would go with a 15" Mac Book Pro.

You can dual boot it, and run windows on it. it's metal, GeForce 8600m GT with 256 Meg of DDR3 ram, an inch thick, 4 gig of ram, back lit keyboard, good sound, great screen, reliable, built in webcam, dvd writer, Dual Core Intel, 5.4 pounds... and if you plan on doing stuff outside of gaming, like screw with pictures you take in the Philippines, make a movie to send back home, or want to setup a blog, it's got OSX. OSX comes with all that crap for free, and it's all better they anything you can purchase on the PC, regardless of cost.

http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/

Last year, the fastest Windows Vista machine, rated by PC magazine, was the Mac Book Pro.

Get a dell, those are pretty good.

If you want a gaming laptop, dell/alienware

If you want an amazingly good laptop that plays games put not XBOX 360 quality games, go for sony vaio.

Laptops are not practical at all for gaming. I use to have one and it would heat up so much. Also the battary is usually really weak so running a laptop while not plugged in gives you a few hours at best. You might have enough juice to watch a movie with full brightness before your battery dies. Also keep in mind that if you are travelling, there might not be a proper power socket for your laptop to recharge though you can probably buy a converter of some sort. Personally I would wait until they come out with those new batteries that last longer and don't heat up.

asus FTW cheep over powered good quality laptops

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220303
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220309
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220306
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220305
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220307
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220322

the better/cheaper ones are out of stock and i dont feel like searching :P
but believe me.. asus FTW

If you're not looking to game on it (and, as others said, gaming on a laptop isn't that practical), I'll be the rare guy to say get a Mac Book or a Mac Book Pro. Incredibly fast, light weight, no virus worries, long battery life, much better OS. And most documents these days can work on either OS. Hell, if you really want some of the features of a PC, you can even get Boot Camp.

HP??