I have a friend who has a NEC laptop for roughly 7 years already, the thing is physically not in very good shape, and seems to overheat sometimes as the fan is not working very well anymore. But it always comes back alive! Never been sent for repairs before, as far as I know.
I used an Acer before myself, and even though nothing was seriously wrong with it, its performance didn't impress me for the price I paid. Given the choices out there, quite unlikely I'll choose Acer again.
I don't know about performance, but reliability-wise NEC should be a good bet.