Well, I actually just bought the Sony Vaio. It took me a while to hit the "Place Order" button, but I don't regret my purchase.
I looked at the HP Pavilion and the Sony Vaio in stores. I realized that there are a lot of things I don't like about the aesthetics of the HP, but those articles about the malfunction rates kind of worried me as well. I do believe that a lot of malfunctions are due to the users though. This laptop is going to be taken care of though.
Thanks for the input everyone. I believe I made a good purchase here.