If he hasn't had a PPC before, chances are he'll go about a month before flashing...

I was new to PPCs and went nearly 3 months before I reflashed mine... but then again I got my TP the day it came out and there weren't ROMs available for quite some time.

As a tip, set up UC or Sashimi early! It's much easier to get it started then just add programs to it as you download them instead of trying to collect all of your crap together and compile it into one of those programs.