Welcome Golandrinel, always great to see another person from Albion around here!
I've found this to be the most consistently good-natured community on the web, and I'm sure you'll enjoy yourself here.
My take on d20?
One of the key ideas that WotC wanted was "options not restrictions", so in 3e as compared to 1/2e D&D there are generally a lot more options that can be taken, and players (as well as DM's) will find less straitjackets and more opportunities to weigh up which route best fits a particular character concept.
Another key idea was to provide a consistent basic rules mechanic, and rules for all situations (to make it easier for new DM's to handle stuff without guessing). this tends to make some stuff - particularly combat - a bit more rules heavy than it used to be.
Cheers