Why did my husband buy this piece of junk?

I am the owner of a Dell Laptop Inspiron, purchased in April of 2008. Since I've had this, it has crashed several times and because it was warranted, Dell fixed it - replacing a battery, replacing either motherboard or hard drive, not sure which. It has since crashed again but unfortunately it's no longer under warranty. I did run a diagnostics and so far the hard ware is fine. I did get an error message regarding the ping test. Now when I turn it on, I get a blank screen with the message "NTLDR is missing". Before I spend the big bucks, could someone please tell me what I'm up against here.

DELL SUCKS!!!!!! DELL MUST DIE!!!!! DON'T GET A DELL, DUDE!!!!