What are good 3rd party email services

Companies that I have heard of and had experience with include constant contact, bronto, blue hornet.

I do not like Constant Contact as I think the user interface and emails templates that they use are very difficult to work with and time consuming. I have not worked with other 3rd party email providers. I have reviewed mailchimp and they look ok but do not have any experience with them. Does anyone have any comments about their service and deliverability?

I have considered using our own mail server to send marketing email and having our own email program but my experience has been that the time, effort, and headaches of managing mailing lists and email servers is not worth it. Plus there seems to be a notion of better deliverability using one of the big email companies to send rather then sending from your own domain.

I'd be interested in any comments, links to resources comparing email services, etc.

Thanks