Thanks to everyone for their advice. In addition to asking on my blog, I IM'd and talked with friends who have used the 17" MBP and/or PowerBook in the past or present.

I came to a few conclusions before making my choice:

- When I need the screen space it's usually going to be when I'm not mobile, in which case I'm better off hooking up a big external display. For the difference in price I can get a 22" or 24" display when I really need it.

- My eyes just aren't prepared to deal with even smaller pixels. I've already increased the font size in Mail and am constantly increasing font size / zooming.

- My bag gets heavy enough at school, increasing the weight of my laptop by 26% would really suck.

I did seriously consider getting a normal MacBook and a 24" iMac - the cost would have been close to that of a 17" MacBook Pro, but the screen size of the MacBook would be a problem for me, and I'd rather buy an iMac for the family, not for myself.

Because I'm a student I got a free iPod Nano. They also offered a $130 rebate on a new Canon printer, so I got the Canon PIXMA MP510 Photo printer, which was $179.95. Not sure if that was a student promo or not...

The estimated delivery date is August 21-29. 2-3 weeks? Ack! :-)