I think it boils down to pot luck when buying anything. You can buy any brand of desktop/laptop and either have a good or bad experience with it. My girlfriend bought a Sony Vaio a few years ago and she had nothing but problems with it and Sony customer service is notoriously bad. We both said we would never go near Sony again.
Then i was on the hunt for a new laptop and saw a Sony Vaio, which has an 18.4 inch screen, which i prefer as i design/develop websites and the spec was very high at the time. So, i thought why not give it a go and i am not disappointed as it has served me very well although, i did recently have to replace the C Drive only 14months after purchase date, but seeing as i know how to do those type of fixes it wasn't a huge deal for me, but i was still annoyed. My partner has also bought another Sony Vaio, which is serving her very well. Recently i bought another laptop, which is a Samsung and so far i am very happy with it.
I will say this though... I have found HP laptops to be the most reliable.