check out www.monarchcomputer.com they are great. i bought my computer from them and i couldn't be happier. for 4500 you could do SOOOOO much better than dell or alienware.
Yeah, I would have to agree, dell sucks! The other day I was in the mall and a customer from the dell direct store was harassing a dell employee because his computer sucked so bad and no one would service him. Wow was that great! The best part of the story is when my friends and I yelled from the top balcony "BUY A MACINTOSH!" and he replied "I will after I finish with these two (not a nice word)"
Dell REALLY sucks.
1) Their tech support is worse than Alienware's (trust me, my brother has a Dell and i have an Alienware),
2) Dell buys items in "white boxes" meaning, they are basically blank parts, and Dell is able to put any name on said part,
3) Alienware cases are SO freaking nice! Installing new hardware is SUCH a breeze!
once the option is there to build i think that u should do that! you could save so much. and get much better specs than they would offer, but i would go with dell if i had to buy one. but building is the best option!