Both of which to be remedied in the feature pack. For me though the HUD is one of the least important features. I find it distracting, but clearly from overwhelming posts singing its glory I am in the minority.

Yep. Just like in RL : some captains LOVE it, others just DON'T. Still the PMDG HGS looks IMPRESSIVE and very smooth. And the option to disable/unable it "on the fly" via a simple click a the CDU without the need to reboot FSX is amazing...