Advice wanted on MacBook purchase

Hi all, it's been a while since I last posted!

I've always been a PC user, on various operating systems. The time has come for me to replace my laptop and I've decided that this is the perfect opportunity to get myself a Mac.

Useage for my laptop will be 95% web browser - literally, it'll just be there to sit around my living room or bedroom and provide ******** access to the web. Saying that, who knows what I might want in future.

I am however interested in getting XP on it (no need for Vista), using either Bootcamp or Parallels. I might even want to install Visual Studio on my XP installation.

I'm not interested in the Air, as nice as it would be. My budget is sub-£1000. I like the look of the regular MacBook, but having next to no knowledge of Mac performance I don't know if it's going to be good (fast) enough to meet my requirements.

Does the entry-level MacBook have the hardware to run the OS with all the shiny stuff turned on and still be snappy and responsive? Are there any Mac-only applications that I might come across that are resource hungry? What are Bootcamp and Parallels like for resource useage? Obviously Parallels will be worse, but can I just assume that if I boot into XP it will perform as XP would perform on a PC with those specs? Are they even viable on the entry-level model?

Do any of the Mac fans out there have any advice for purchasing? Is it best to buy direct from *****? What are they like for customer service?

Any other comments (or questions) welcomed - open to all advice, just decided it's time for me to get into all this computer stuff for hippies ;-)

Thanks in advance,