1) I don't think a Eurail pass is good in England.

2) You really don't need a Eurail pass for Italy. In fact, Italy will charge you and additional 15Euro-18Euro to ride the Eurostar trains. P2P tickets there are much better. Also, a few train systems in Italy won't take the Eurail pass. Most notable is the Circumvesuviana train from Naples to Sorrento.

3) The pass will work in Switzerland but if you venture into the Lauterbrunnen Valley and visit Lauterbrunnen, Wengen, Gimmelwald, Muerren or the two mountain tops (Jungfrau and Schilthorn), your pass will only get you a 25% discount on train and gondola fares.

4) In general, you can only use a Eurail pass in countries that share a common border (except Ireland and Greece). If you pass through a country not covered on your pass, you'll have to pay for that part of the journey.

If you buy a Eurail pass that includes France, you can get a passholder's fare of £50 ($71 US) on the Eurostar. However, if you book well in advance at www.eurostar.com, you can get a discount fare of €67 ($85 US) and you won't use a pass day for your London-Paris ride.

Which countries on the Continent do you wish to visit besides France and Italy?

I received a PM from Lee, a regular on this board, correcting what I wrote in my post above. He reminded me that taking the Eurostar and paying the passholder's fare does not use a pass day on a flexipass. However, your date of travel on the Eurostar must fall within the dates the pass is valid.

Thanks everyone for all your input. We're planning on going to Spain, Switzerland, Netherlands, Germany, and possibly Austria in addition to France and Italy.

Jane, a railpass can be useful in Switzerland as train travel there can be a bit expensive. However, I would recommend some type of Swiss pass. The Eurail pass is fine for most of Switzerland but if you are going to the Lauterbrunnen Valley (part of the Bernese Oberland), it will only cover 25% of the rail and gondola costs. Depending on the type of Swiss pass, you will be 50%-100% covered depending on where you go there (high mountain tops are 50% covered).

I'm going to England, France, Switzerland and Italy in the summer. Some of the people here helped me figure out that 2nd class P2P tickets would come up cheaper than the Eurail pass that I was originally planning to purchase.

I suggest that you fine tune your itinerary. Find out exactly where you are going and use one of the those European rail websites to figure out the total cost of your P2P tickets. I used the Swiss rail site.