I used to but from IBM but now only buy from a vendors who actually builds their products:
Quanta sells to (among others) HP/Compaq, Dell, Toshiba, Sony, Fujitsu, Acer, NEC, Gateway and
Lenovo/IBM
Compal sells to Toshiba, HP/Compaq, Acer, and Dell.
Positivo Informatica sells to Samsung, Sony, Siragon, Toshiba, HP
Wistron (former manufacturing & design division of Acer) sells to HP/Compaq, Dell, IBM, NEC, Acer, and
Lenovo/IBM.
Flextronics (former Arima Computer Corporation notebook division) sells to HP/Compaq, NEC, and Dell.
Itautec sells to Siragon, LG, Samsung, Sony
ECS sells to IBM, Fujitsu, and Dell.
Asus sells to Apple (iBook), Sony, and Samsung.
Inventec sells to HP/Compaq, Toshiba, and BenQ.
Lanix sells to Sony, Compaq, Toshiba, Siragon, Itautec
Uniwill sells to
Lenovo/IBM and Fujitsu & PC World UK own brand Advent.
Clevo sells to Sager, VoodooPC, WidowPC and other boutique vendors.
Asus and MSI sell their own stuff
A new sandy bridge laptop from Asus or any Clevo distributor would run you under $1k
http/forum.notebookreview.com/sager-clevo/91510-clevo-guide-v2-0-faq-reseller-info.html
Asus and Clevo can be bought in the US from Prostar an Xoticpc; the former's site is a bit easier to navigate.
Clevo
http/www.pro-star.com/index.cfm?mainpage=product&filter=4
Asus
http/www.pro-star.com/index.cfm?mainpage=product&filter=6