I have a 15", came with a 100GB drive and 1GB of RAM. I upgraded it to 2GB of RAM. RAM upgrades are pretty easy to do yourself, and won't void your warranty. Hard drive upgrades can't be done by you unless you want to void your warranty, and you have a few tools.
1GB is really plenty for most people, 2GB or more is good if you want to use Parallels a lot, do development or high end video or image work.
My Macbook Pro came with an X1600 with 256MB of RAM, it performs quite well, so I'd assume the newer models with the 8600 will end up being even better as the drivers improve.
The keyboard is the best I've used on a laptop.
1GB is really plenty for most people, 2GB or more is good if you want to use Parallels a lot, do development or high end video or image work.
My Macbook Pro came with an X1600 with 256MB of RAM, it performs quite well, so I'd assume the newer models with the 8600 will end up being even better as the drivers improve.
The keyboard is the best I've used on a laptop.