When I go laptop shopping, there's a very short list of things I look for:
1) High-resolution screen. Why buy a 17" widescreen if it's only WXGA (1280x800)? 1680x1050 is a good for a 17", even a 15" widescreen.
2) Serial port. Call me old school, but I still have a lot of devices that use serial. Having this built in isn't hard and is a definite plus.
3) "Trackpoint-style pointer" -
http://xkcd.com/243/
4) Another pet peeve of mine: non-standard insert/delete/home/end/pageup/pagedown keys. If you're going to put them in, put them in the same 2x3 arrangement they are in desktop and some laptop keyboards.
5) Please make the bottom-left key the Ctrl key, not the Fn key. I can't tell you how many times I've hit Fn+C and Fn+V, only to be like, wtf?
In general, I've found 14.1" laptops are "my size" - I've had a Precision M20/Latitude D610 (same computer) and Thinkpad T60, and for me they're the best I've seen: 1400x1050 screen, finger mouse, etc. If only there was a laptop that had the T60's battery life and dual core processor (the optionally protruding battery doesn't bother me) with the M20/D610's ports - serial and parallel, plus plenty of USB, VGA, S-Video, Gig-Etherenet, DVD+-RW, etc. and the M20/D610's keyboard layout (with Ctrl in the corner and full home/insert/etc.) ... that would be sweet.
The rest - hard drive, DVD+-RW, battery life, screen size (resolution is important to me, not size), Bluetooth 2.0+EDR, etc. - all are secondary to me. Oh yeah, the numberpad thing, while kinda cool, ... yeah that's all it is. Just "kinda cool".
Thanks for listening to our feedback!