I'm in need of upgrade, have a 4 yr old iBook that still runs great but have been waiting for the intel macbook. Now that it's out, a little apprehensive re how hot it runs. I know older power books have/had problem and surprised apple never solved the problem for their new line of macprobook and macbook.

So jury is still out for me - but for what you described, i think macbook is more than enough. And definitely get at least 1gb Ram.

You might also want to read through this thread (don't be fooled by the title) re getting WinXp up and running: http://flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=587690