On my opinion you should give easy-debian a try.
It's much easyer (!) to install and manage, since it allows you to use both environments, starting the new desktop manager as a maemo app. Moreover, if you want to free as much ram as possible (which is a good idea) you can install a script called "switch to LXDE" (or something like that) which shuts down the maemo desktop and some uneeded processes (am I right?) before running LXDE.
And yes, it's LXDE and not GNOME but trust me: it's more healthy for your tablet...