Cars - any car you can get good parts supply off and a decent amount of set-up help . I have a RC8, strong, agile and good parts and set-up support. Xray are built like tanks and never break! Same with the 'Moogen'.
Engines - like jamie said stick to the 'bigger' brands. Novarossi based engines are always really good engines (RB, Nova Rossi, Axe Rossi etc). OS engines....some say good but some say utter rubbish. Sirio, seem reliable and have a very nice crackily sound to them
. If you're not totally confident in tuning whilst your learning get the Picco P3 engine (do not get the P3r they are *%$@ !). Great engine and for £75 (from what i saw last) you can't really go wrong
Reliability - if you clean the car frequently (that's everything) it will last ages. Engines, no need to take them apart (if it ain't broke don't fix it). Just replace the airfilter every so often with a NEW one. There's lots of ways to break in engines. As long as you get heat into it before you start it and run it rich (with temps around 200F) you'll be fine. Engines have been known to go 10gallons before losing compresion
. They aren't to hard to tune and if you get stuck someone is always willing to help out.
Servos - Ace/AE, Futaba, Sanwa or Savox. Don't really want to skimp out on servo's as it will bite you in the arse later on
lol
Fuel - Big brands for safety. OD's and Byron.
Pit people - Usually somebody always wants a hand or will be wiling to help put. I've posted a few messages on other forums and usually always got a response