Dell ca. 2000 had some great stuff. Optiplex desktops were good, Latitude laptops were good. Anything that they sold out of an insert in the Sunday paper was junk.
See, there's my problem. I had a handful of Dells in the mid-2000s that all came out of the cheap end of the catalog, and I skimped on some of the specs to fit them in the budget. I did definitely get my $20 worth out of the optional floppy drive, though.