One qualitative difference: the "I'm feeling lucky" button (which you can use if you hit right-arrow on a search suggestion) has actually become useful. You can start typing, scroll down to an entry you like, and check the snippet of the top result -- all without clicking any buttons.

This is a pretty big deal to people like me who go to great lengths to avoid using the mouse. I've not tried it much because I don't usually search from the google homepage, but maybe I'll try it now.