The cygwin Node install isn't so bad if you have a comprehensive list of prerequisite packages [1].
I also downloaded a script called `apt-cyg` that lets me download and install new cygwin packages from the command line rather than digging out setup.exe [2].
[1] https://github.com/joyent/node/wiki/Building-node.js-on-Cygw...
[2] http://code.google.com/p/apt-cyg/