I am very familiar with PayPal as I use their merchant services on a novelty Tshirt site that I own. They are a good option, or better yet, an "OK" option. Even with their "real" merchant services account they are more expensive. Also, they hold your funds more than twice as long as other providers, which rubs me the wrong way. And I think most importantly, PayPal is great for small, mom & pop style sites (like novelty Tshirt sites!), but it has a stigma of not being as professional as "real" CC processors. Whether that is correct or incorrect, I do know that conversion rate is everything and that Authorize.net logo tells users that not only is their transaction safe, the company charging them was able to qualify for the Authorize.net service, and the qualification for an online business was fairly grueling! I do agree that PayPal will probably be OK in 90% of applications, but in mine I need the professionalism of Authorize.net.
So... anyone care to help out a guy with very limited coding knowledge and a site that is ready to launch and try to make this work? *waits longingly and hopefully* Thanks!