Hey Las!
-The Italians are quite good out of the box, as it were. They can more than hold their own against the "core" nations, and if you decide you want some variety later on, you can always work up an allied fleet.
-The
DW 2.0 rules are indeed out, I've got a detailed review up as well as a few other articles on my blog:
http://www.manbattlestations.com/blog/tag/dw-2-0/
-As for
DW versus
DL, I can't speak directly for
DL since I haven't played it. The minis are quite nice for both games, but there is less selection in
DL. Plus, you might find it more difficult to find players for
DL. Part of the problem is that there are a lot of 28mm skirmish games out there, where as
DW is the only steam-punk naval game! My recommendation would be to go with
DW, but
YMMV.