Notebooks: DELL Vs Sony

I was reading a review about budget laptop design.
It compared Dell Inspiron 1420 and Sony VAIO NR160. Factors that are compared are keyboards, profile and looks. It is, however, not a comprehensive list of factors that you would really measure.

My take on this:

1. Sony is easy to purchase in open market whereas DELL is not. DELL leverages on direct sales. There are no DELL kiosks that you will find in any mall in India(atleast I have not seen !)
2. Service centers for DELL are much easier to access as they have call support. On the contrary, there are no service centers you can walk into.
3. Sony is overpriced like it's other products(usually ... I have not had good experience with my Sony Music System and Car Stereo)
4. In DELL, once you purchase with Vista, and later on if you downgrade it, they charge you more for support.
5. DELL can be customised easily online, but Sony is a bit rigid in that.

I would prefer DELL to SONY for it's value for money and on call support. With SONY, I have not seen any presence in corporates the way it is there for DELL, Lenovo and HP.

Yuo can read the original post here(Dell vs. Sony: Budget laptop design).

The author, in a way, recommends HP pavilion. Also, from what I have read online and seen till now, HP seems to the one which satisfy the domestic sector with it's high quality servicing.

HP is my next buy I guess ....