In the past month or two, I've come around on Unity after hiding out in gnome-session-fallback and then cinnamon. With the launch bar icons shrunk to their smallest size and Docky on the bottom, the Unity interface has gotten to the point where it's smooth and usable. Call me a convert, but I decided Unity has gotten to the point where it's easier to work with it than to keep trying to work against it.
Well, not quite the level of praise that "it's worth the hassle of installing", but "not worth the hassle of uninstalling" is worth something, I guess.
I'm interested to experience what changes 12.10 brings to Unity. I have a hunch that sooner or later, Unity will improve to the point where it meets your former criterion as well as your latter.
