I agree that quality has declined somewhat under Lenovo, but the old T43 was a goddamn tank. I've got one hooked up to my tv for streaming - it puts out full 1080 with DVI if you get the dock. I think it was also north of $2k when new.

So, no, the current t520 is not as well engineered as those old ones, but it's still better than the vast majority of its peers. And you get some great deals on refurbs and open boxes on outlet.lenovo.com.

Current MBA is only 4gb ram. That's a deal breaker for me.