Why not try paging on scroll, similar to Google Reader? I think there was a plugin for just that a while ago.
I'm just not a big fan of that technique from a usability standpoint. Regular non-techie people are not used to unexpected things happening when they scroll.
If someone wants to load 10,000 rows into their browser at once (and apparently they do), that's their business. As long as the server is unaffected then it's ok by me.
-- Josh
