I don't have any experience with other laptops, but both my previous Thinkpad Z61m and my current Lenovo T500 have been great at running Linux and generally run

I don't have any experience with other laptops, but both my previous Thinkpad Z61m and my current Lenovo T500 have been great at running Linux and generally running without a problem. The only thing that really sucks are the batteries. On average they last around 18 months, so you have to take 2 * $100 for new batteries into account.