The second one is better, more typographic. I wouldn't call it really uncommon, though.
Still, I would maintain some icons (but the one for "in 15 seconds" should have the hand horizontal).

I like #2. I agree though that it's not all that uncommon; it just seems like a smart choice in this context. The rhetorical questions and very brief paragraphs seem to do a good job of drawing the viewer/reader in more quickly. The only thing that's very slightly bugging me is that the measure seems to be a tad on the longish side. Can you make that column a little bit narrower,* or the type a bit bigger? Barring both options, I might increase the leading a bit. But it's really not a big problem.

* Don't let it get wider than this, in case this is a fluid layout.

I meant uncommon for a tech website. I have looked at dozens upon dozen sites and very few stray away from the straight-forward columnized layout. That's if they have a notion of a layout to begin with :-)

Riccardo, I hear you regarding the icons, they add considerably to the site appearance. I just haven't decided where they should go yet.

Nina, I agree with regards to the width of the text column. I had this concern but decided not to mention it to see if someone else would bring it up.

One other change that I'm considering is to break the text into smaller sections like so - Option 3.

After massaging the layout a bit more I have arrived at this:

( full-size sketch )

I think it is starting to look pretty darn good :-)

It still needs work, especially in terms of making it look less "dry" and "boring", but otherwise I think the layout is both interesting and functional.

What do you guys think?

Flush the right side and your'e set.

Can you rephrase that please ?

Let the right side be ragged.

Do not force the paragraph; let it be ragged, so the word space won't get affected by "near enough" parameters.

Ah, OK. It's flush left actually, that's why I asked. I hear you though, I will try both alignments once I have the copy finalized.

The beta site is now live - https://beta.certtime.com

I am still not 100% convinced that this layout works better than the more traditional columnized one. I guess only way to find out.... stares at the Apache log...

Typographically you are set. My concern is that huge blue rectangle taking everybody's attention. Make your business the front. I still do not know what that is. And without that I can not help you.

Great to hear. Thanks, Tomi. The big empty banner is just a placeholder, it will get its presentation-style content a bit later on.