[espeed]

There's much more to a productive programming environment than IDEs, and most Python programmers don't use IDEs anyway.

The OP says he wants to do a startup and plans to go to grad school for physics, but in terms of programming, he doesn't really know what he wants.

That's why he is asking for advice on what path to take -- he is asking for "preferences," recommendations, and guidance. How many startups do you know that run Windows? How many high-performance physics labs?

When people were asking for faster horses, they didn't know to ask for automobiles because they didn't know that was something to consider. The had no perspective. Helping someone onto a more productive path from the start can help them get to where they want to go faster in the long run.

How long does it take to run a marathon? The OP has a timeline of 6 months.