WARNING: If you are not a tech head, do not listen to the tech heads.
Seriously, while building your own PC may be the cheapest and best way to go, if you are not familiar with how to do this I would NOT BUILD YOUR OWN. Too much can and will go wrong. You could fry your motherboard, break components, or just plum forget something important and then wonder why your PPC has trouble running Excel. But if you are a tech head, go right ahead.
I recommend Dell. They have great customer service, high quality and warrantees. The prices are a little more than say HP or Compaq, but you definitely get what you pay for. The case looks great and you crack it open like your would open a book for easy upgrading. Plus, unlike other PC makers, Dell is non-proprietary and the warrantee is STILL GOOD if you crack the case and ticker with the insides (as long as you ddon't fry anything
). I saved money and upfgraded to 512 of RDRAM myself, and my warrantee is still intact. I'll be upgrading to 9600 Pro shortly
Gateway used to be good, but now the more techies I talk to the less respect I have for them. I actually talked to people in my IT department and they recommended getting a Compaq before a Gateway.
Alienware used to be good as well, but evidently they were bought put by some company and their customer service and quality have gone down considerably since then.