Well, I caved in and bought it tonight. After reading over a hundred personal reviews I realized people either absolutely hated it or loved it, NO in between. No offense to anyone, but the ones who said they hated it were really picking it apart it seemed and I really had no idea what they were talking about. Anyways, it took exactly 90 minutes to install. Didn't lose one single file in the upgrade process which was great. Simply put in the CD, clicked install, and then clicked "Upgrade." Didn't have to touch it again for 80 min, and then I just had to say "ok" twice to the time zones and date. Left it alone for another 10 min. and it was good to go.
The only problem I ran into was that it tried to run a different graphic card/driver that I don't have or something. It was odd, because after I fixed the resolution and stuff, all the font and taskbars were fine and the correct size. However the screen was stretched from left to right and the desktop icons were a little large. Since I have an HP, it came with this very useful recovery thing for drivers and disc recovery. So I pulled up the start menu and re-installed my NVidia graphic driver. Re-booted, fixed the resolution again but this time wtih the NVidia card and I'm perfect.
Been on it for about 30 min. so far and has some pretty neat features. Nothing too special for me, but I know I was going to buy Vista eventually so I might as well get it now. I figure when the updates do come out, I'll have them immediately so everything should be good!