Good points above, but servers are a different kettle of fish; IMHO.
I'm pretty sure each brand takes them more seriously than desktops, laptops and printers (at least, I hope they do). Server stability / durability is pretty critical for those of us that spend that sort of money, never mind the brand trust created between them and the admins. I've never used anything other than custom built gigabyte desktops for small internal server usage and medium to massive dell servers. They are probably over-priced but, I like them so far.
Regarding custom build gigabyte boxes with software/hardware raid: Even though they don't come with fancy stuff like "server management software", redundant power suppliers etc. they can run for years if setup and backed up correctly. Can be a big cost saving if you don't need much more. For small to medium company they are a serious consideration. Especially with the power of cpu's nowdays, XEN (virtualization), RAM size and price, SATA drives. Always find it sick when small companies are told. "Your going to need a R50 000 [insert brand here] monster server for your email and proxy server." Not to mention the usual Windows server costs the come with it, when the linux stuff is free.....
Guess I've heard some good things about each and every server brand so far. SLA's might have something to do with it as you mentioned above. Or just that few server admins stick with brands they don't like for long. Plus linux server just work when installed correctly....
Other things to consider for laptops that get me annoyed.
How much
bloatware does it come with. Lenovo (last I checked) came with tons. Another point: does the laptop come with a
restore CD/DVD (sucky)
or a proper Windows 7
install CD/DVD (home, business, pro / ultimate). If your a ubuntu / OSx person then this will never be a issue for you.
Dell is no saint here either, but they usually give you the proper Windows 7 CD/DVD and hence if you know how to install a fresh Windows 7 (how can one not with the simplicity of Windows 7's installer) then your bloatware is gone (unless its at a OS level like Internet Explorer
). The last Lenovo laptop I got had a restore CD/DVD (which I had to burn myself); same for HP. If you forget to burn that CD/DVD set then you need to call them and pay for your OS/bloated thing to be shipped to you. They can take ages to restore, can be confusing to newbies (how does this DVD work / boot etc), get lost more easily in a collection of blank discs. Are prone to error on creation (that if the user ever actually creates them, I can just imagine how many times people have tried to reinstall that laptops and then discovered they were meant to burn restore CD'S/DVD's before hand).
My biggest annoyance with dell lately is the call centre menu and that annoying menu voice, the lack of driver updates for a gaming graphics card on notebooks (they never seem to keep up with Nvidia driver releases for the laptops I purchase from what I can tell). I could be wrong and its possible that Nvidia releases are sometimes mainly for desktop cards and hence dell don't repackage a notebook drivers as it has no beneficial features for that notebook.... not sure.
Dell DVD drives also suck (in my experience), especially those ones without the trays. I've had so many CD's and DVD's get stuck in those (Restart the laptop and press eject seems to fix it for some nutty reason).
All that said: when I've had a problem (which has been a small/negligible percent of overall Dell purchases) I just call them while under 3-4 year warranty and someone comes the next day and replaces the mobo,gfx card, display panel, DVD drive or whatever.... no quibble.
Don't get me started on printers. Especially MFP: are there any out there that actually work 100% properly? Don't have ink/toner replacement costs that make you squirm inside? Actually scan without some 3rd party software to help them over a network? Come with drivers that don't bloatup and take control of your OS? etc etc.
Sigh.
sorry....
