Returning to Windows...maybe?

Well, I'm back. That didn't take long.

I apologize for the lengthy post, and I know there's a lot of threads like this already around , but my situation is rather complex and I'm suffering from "can't see the forest for the trees" syndrome.

Just to recap, I'm the one who posted the "finally fed up with Windows" rant nearly four months ago. Reinstalling XP was giving me fits, we were looking at reducing our family computer count from 2 to 1, and I was ready to pack it up and go back entirely to Linux.

Then I downloaded the Windows 7 RC. It blew me away. It still does, in some respects, but more on that later....

I'm reconfiguring our home computer setup, with the following parameters:

Office: We've decided we still need to retain the office, with it's own computer. One of the objectives is to reduce the clutter in the Living Room. Another is to make it possible for the wife or I to work when the kids are otherwise occupied on the HTPC (no, we don't babysit our kids with TV--we limit their TV time pretty strictly, actually).

1.) The office machine needs to run WordPerfect (this is non-negotiable--if the Wife ain't happy, nobody's happy ).

2.) I'm planning on using the office machine for critical music listening (i.e. my headphone setup) as well. Helps get more clutter out of the living room, protects my more expensive hardware, and is a just plain great excuse to turn the office into more of a "library/den" arrangement .

3.) Music arranging could be on either machine--either Finale or Rosegarden, depending on the platform. I've gotten to the point where I'm willing to play around with extracting parts to Lilypond, just because the output looks so awesome.

4.) Printer will be on this machine.

Living Room HTPC:

5.) The primary uses will be recorded kids shows for the boys, and my own selection of TV recordings/movies, and streamed shows.

6.) Occasional browsing and listening to the stereo (much of this is as background, not critical listening).

7.) At this point, Windows 7 seems to be the OS of choice for the HTPC. It's the most seamless by far, it's TV guide and DVR functions are well-implemented, and, most importantly, it actually has the most WAF of anything we've tried (see #1, above). My wife figured out how to do scheduled recording all by herself on it.

I don't really want to pay for *two* installations of Windows 7, so was thinking of trying out Linux Mint for the Office/Critical Listening machine. I was able to get my 1212m working in Ubuntu so I figured Mint shouldn't be a problem. There are a couple big caveats, though:

I never got WordPerfect to print through Wine in Ubuntu, so that could be a deal-breaker.

I'd like to be able to share the music library with the HTPC--unfortunately the first time I networked a Windows machine to a Linux box I remember it being a huge headache to implement. At the start of this experiment I never got Windows 7 to talk with my linux box when I still had it running.

I feel like I've been chasing my tail figuring out a clear solution. Should I bite the bullet and pay for two Windows 7 installations (yes I want to do this all legally)? Are there other options/possibilities I'm writing off too quickly?

Now, that's an "outside the box" solution. The G5 option looks particularly appealing.

Apple TV looks pretty inexpensive, actually, but I prefer to get OTA ATSC. Doesn't look like that's really lines up with how Apple's targeting that cute little box.

Anybody running a Mac desktop for their HTPC with an ATSC tuner? I could see actually getting two G5's (There's a lot on eBay), if there's a decent DVR frontend.

That (and the family pack) looked awesome! Unfortunately I need an OEM or full version. I can no longer install XP on my current hardware.

It supposedly has a cleaner interface (or perhaps more windows-centric, which is important for WAF), and has more hardware support--something with my Ubuntu install was simply not working with WP-->Wine printing, which is critical.

Of course, my Ubuntu install was actually "Mythbuntu," which I hear has some issues in and of itself.

EDIT: Sorry for all the double-posts. Busy thread!

I for some reason had serious hardware issues this last time around. Worse than what I had before. My assumption is I would need to install it in order to install an upgrade version of W7. Actually, the point is moot because now I see that you have to do a clean install when upgrading from XP.

Where did you get it? Everything I've found says "upgrade" on the box and includes specific instructions that it can only upgrade XP or Vista. Then there's this:

Questions on Windows 7 Home Premium Family Pack License