Funnily enough, i have just been through that exact same ordeal with someone i know.
He wanted a Tiny computer but i explained to him that whereas it may look good on paper, the products are not good at all (e.g. 800fsb cpu using PC2700 memory, non pro 9800, 2mb cache SATA hdd, you have to pay £35 extra for even an XP recovery CD, no chance of the original!) little (or big) things like that that show how the company cut major corners in order to maximise their profit takings.
I directed him to novatech, and he liked the look of their P4 and Centrino Laptops!
Novatech are generally really quite good. They aren't a huuge company, they are quite local to me, based in Cosham down in Portsmouth. Used them on several occasions, loads quite recently for thigs like CD-DVD drives to a TFT monitor (17" black and silver 16ms response 16.7m colours £174 inc VAT and it was the best one i ever used!)
Yeah Novatech should do you good - all systems are built onsite and tested before despatch.
As they are quite small, customer service should be reasonable, not that i have had to deal with them.
Oh i did have to RMA a product, got the new one in about a week. Thats not bad
Hope that helps,
Kind Regards
Chris