tallsandwich
That chip on your shoulder is a stubborn old thing.
It is complete sophistry that IE in Parallels doesn't work in "full screen" properly. I have it running in full screen now without any trouble. A new feature called "Coherence" enables switching between Mac and applications within XP seemlessly, too. I have no problems with scrolling in Parallels either, as it accepts the two-finger scrolling (and right-clicking) standard on Mac laptops, something which no PC laptop can do, as far as I'm aware.
I was sorry to hear about your tribulations with the Mac-formatted LaCie drive. It's a shame that PCs can't read Mac-formatted drives, yet Macs can easily (and without drivers) read PC-formatted drives...
Applemacster