Fantastic, gotdamnsg.

Good to know that you're going after a 17" MacBook Pro. Bully for you.

Now, for that 7200 vs 5400 RPMs. Well, regardless of how you handle your HD. It's not much of a problem. Unless, of course, if you're using all those softwares you've mentioned before. If you don't want laggs, I suggest to stick with 7200.

Besides, what with HDs going down in prices nowadays you can always run FireWire on your apps.

The big hunking kitty (Leopard) is coming by October. That's what I've read.

Finally, get a hard case for your MBP. You'll understand why soon.

I am sorry I could not give you the links/prove but I've read somewhere the benchmark about the HDDs.

100GB SATA @7200 RPM vs 160GB SATA @5400 RPM

The 160GB SATA @5400 RPM will perform as fast as 100GB @7200 RPM.
This is fact. You can try to google it.

that's a good choice....get macbook, get everything..