IBM isn't gone... they sold to Lenovo, who promply hired IBM to run the division for them. For at least the next few years, IBM will still be IBM, just owned by lenovo. Also, it now looks liek the FTC might block the sale of IBM to lenovo. Still, IBM and Apple are definitely the cream of the laptop crop.

Also, while you're stuck on the trackpad, you can definitely connect a multi button mouse to a mac machine.