i buy the best quality i can find. obviously, i sell Honda's, so that's what i've represented for 32 years....and it's always about quality and reliability. and i've seen what Honda will do to stand behind it's products. i've always enjoyed that the quality of their products is consistent from the most inexpensive power product to the over $50k Acura. i know about their requirments of their parts suppliers as far as spec and precision.
i've also appriased trade-ins for 40 years i've been in the car business. hundreds a year. with trade-ins true quality has no place to hide. and it's there that Honda really stands out for the simple fact that everything works even under heavy use no matter the age. even somewhat compared to luxury brands.
i also only buy Honda power products if i can. i own a Honda trimmer, a self propelled Honda snowblower, and a Honda pressure washer. i did buy a Kuboda diesel tractor/lawn mower partially because i percieved it to be very high quality. i've owned it for 2 years and it has worked perfectly. i do try to only buy stuff once.
like Amir; i bought a Sony Vaio laptop, a Z series. it has the metal case, and i really love the lightweight flexible screen part. most laptops have a heavy screen and the hinge fails because the screen is too heavy and stresses the hinge. not the 'Z' series Vaio. the only problem is that i've now had it for 5 years and it still works perfectly even though i travel with it 8-10 times a years and use it every day, but it is getting a bit slow. i'm torn whether i need to upgrade because the darn thing just works and takes abuse. i have not yet dropped it.
in Home Theatre a few years back i bought a JVC 1080p projector which was quite high quality. but i wanted to go to the higher level projectors (SIM2) but they were too expensive for HT for me. then i waited until the level of performance i wanted dropped to a more reasonable price range. earlier this year the 4K Sony projector came out and i did step up. now there is going to be 4K software you can buy for this projector. i'm glad i waited to get the right high quality projector to take advantage of the highest format on the horizon.
as far as audio gear.....well.....darTZeel, Rockport, Studer, Ampex.......i do tend to step up to the highest quality when that choice is presented assuming the performance goes along with it.