schloss...
I have no brand to plug (I have a year old DELL, a worm infected 4 year old Gateway, and a new IBM laptop), but my experience in 'pooter buying is to load up with more ram and CPU speed than you think you will need. My next monitor will be 21" rather than the 17" (flat panel, the only way to go) I got last time - as I get older, the eyes get worse and I my end up with a large screen projection model <gg>.
I will plug my all time favorite computer device - the wireless optical mouse, which I could not live without.
In edit, almost forgot -- I have a 4 month old DELL laptop also, but no one is using it at the moment - what a waste.
Good luck.
mlsoft