>4)I stay 1 or 2 miles from the conference site, would this impair my Devcon experience academically or entertainment wise?

The 98 DevCon I stayed at a hotel right around the corner from the conference hotel &it really sucked IMHO. Every night we went thru this dog-n-pony show regarding whether I was going to drive myself home. Plus shuffle my conference bag all night long, or putting it in someone's room & trying to remember who or where they were at the was the next day... Plus I think I ended up leaving my rental car behind at the conference hotel more often than not. So my opinion is that it's a BIG PITA to stay at another hotel.