Xfce is perfect for people like you how like you who liked the old Gnome. But at least one thing in Gnome 3 sounds interesting to me (I have not tried it yet) - the fact that you always have one empty virtual desktop ready for use. I think it could be an interesting experiment to have something like that in Xfce, but of course keeping the current UI layout more or less the same.

i'm an archlinux and gentoo user  with gnome 2.XX , now I'm in search for a new GUI for replace gnome ( or better : for not update gnome 2 in to gnome 3 !)  and  about xfce, i tink thet it's a good GUI !

bye!