QP kgoerz,
Regarding the Dell military discount:
http://www.dell.com/content/topics/s...=us&l=en&cs=19
Third question down.
As far as laptops go, I have been using a mix of IBM(now Lenovo) and Dell of the years, I currently work off of a Latitude E6400, it's a solid machine, but heavy. We recently purchased a few 14zs, nice machines and we have been getting some good feedback from our people in the field who they have been assigned to.
Techbargains(
http://www.techbargains.com/) is a good site to keep an eye on current deals, find a make/model that meet your eye and budget and some Google-fu should tell you a bit about reviews, reliability etc.
HTH,
BOfH