Thanks so much for the info. I kind of figured there would be some problems, but have been a little shocked I haven't been hearing much. I will take a look at that post, hopefully there will be some newer posts that will be more relevant and the old ones have been mostly resolved.
Hopefully I won't have any compatibility issues. My main program I want to use is Photoshop Elements, it is a few years old and the main reason I'm getting a new computer is for this program. My old laptop just has a hard time with it lately. It is okay for regular tasks, but doesn't quite have it for PSE. The only other thing would be my Microsoft Office, which is 3 or 4 years old, can't remember the exact name, but is was the best one I could find. Hopefully it will work, but for the time being I plan to continue to use it on my old laptop. When the time comes, I will uninstall and put on the new one. I don't really want to switch to the new office, while it looks pretty good, I don't want to relearn everything, which is kind of the case, from what I have heard.
As far as components. I think I've pretty much customized it to have the highest option, but I need to double check on that. When I get a little more serious I will probably have a few more posts to run things by all you pros to see what you think.
Thanks again!