Anyway, the HP (being an american company)
Is not IBM American too?
has screwed up quality and the sub-terranian levels to which they have dropped, I will actually be willing to pay a premium for a Chinese brand if the alternate is to buy HP. so it is not whether you are american or chinese, it is quality v/s price. 5 years of having Florina as the CEO has moved Compaq / HP's laptops from being the most desired to the most shunned.
My Compaq Presario 2203AL will be turning 2 years this October, and till date I have had absolutely no issues whatsoever. It has survived 3 not-so-gentle falls and some pretty rigorous usage (downloads running for hours on end, fairly regular linux compilation, and so on). On the otherhand I have seen my room-mates' Acer Travelmate give some minor issues. One of his speakers went kaput, and until very recently he had trouble configuring ACPI in GNU/Linux.
Regards, Debarshi