Inventory idea(s): 1. 'Suspended' noncommital eq arrangement, 2...

caruga

1. in a certain (toggled, held with keypress) mode, you can move items around to hover over slots without them dropping into the slots when you release the mouse, to give time to leisurely peruse pre-commitment changes in an alternative manner.

You can also observe in your character window what difference the items are making (if any) to your effective stats (THAC0, AC, Damage). Then you hit a trigger (click something, or maybe release something) and the items all fall into the slots (confirm the eq arrangement), OR, with a different trigger, they revert to their original slots (i.e. you decide to stick with the original eq).

caruga

2. In lieu of this idea of time passage on the shop screen: make time pass during the inventory screen (configurable/toggleable) but rather than continuously like in BG1, have passage of time (and game state) update when items actually move around in small increments (like 1/4 of a round per item moved/equipped). It removes the urgency of negotiating the UI during combat (and I think is not in the spirit of turn-based combat), but also makes you have to pause and think about what you're doing.