[hugogee]

I was in similar shoes a couple weeks ago. After a few T??? lenovos crapping out (It was always the dang video cards) I just could not buy another. My first replacement was a behemoth of a dell xps 15. Unfortunately the quad core could not make up for the size and poor build quality. The 2gb nvidia optimus video incompatability with linux sealed the deal. It had to go! DO NOT buy a laptop with optimus if you are planning on using linux. To make a long story short i am running an elitebook 840 i7 which came with a 256gb samsung 840 pro. Archlinux installed without too much fuss. I could not be happier! Its fantastic-well built, small, and powerful. You will love it even more if you are acustomed to using a trackpoint. Im so glad i did not listen to those marginal reviews re: this unit.

Re: Arch maintenance, a daily 'pacman -Syu' will usually keep your system running healthy. Arch does not like to be ignored for too long. ^_^