>so I think I'll have an opportunity to try out a Linux laptop again soon, but I'm more dreading than looking forward to it. Maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised.

Current crop of laptops aren't particularly good. They are all plagued by various thermal issues due to the quad-core CPUs in ultrabook form factors. Even thinkpads have suspend resume issues right now. Avoid the thin ones. Avoid nvidia. Save some money, and go with something a bit older.