This was a very useful post, thanks a lot!
Guess I won't be buying AppleCare then.
This just means I can take it to a Genius and they'll give me the same stuff as with AppleCare? Literally all I miss is being able to phone them?
You can still phone them, they just won't talk you through software issues and the like. My Mrs' MacBook battery died suddenly. She phoned Apple and they sent a courier to collect it and dropped it back.