I've wanted to do this conversion for a while but have heard both positive and negative things from both sides. I've heard that my car will runner smoother with an HEI and I will feel a HP increase, but I've also heard that if points are set up right, I won't notice much of a difference because they will be producing enough spark. Any thoughts?

You're not likely to feel any difference. The real advantage to HEI is very little maintenance. If you put a lot of miles on your car it may be worth it. If like a lot of guys, only a few thousand a year, it's a toss up. Points work just fine but not forever.

Our L78 car had an HEI when we bought it. This distributor worked fine until it died. I installed a good Delco points distributor with Accel HD points (Not the race points). That works fine too and checking and changing the points isn't much a job anyway and only takes a few minutes. I check the dwell once a year for good measure. This last set of points have been the car for five years now. Probably the only way that you would notice a difference would be if the distributor that you are taking out has problems.