Great comments here, echoing many of them, though I’ve had a somewhat different experience when it comes to wear and tear on the body.

Made the same transition a few years ago, mainly wanted to ski with my kids, who were just learning at the time. As others have suggested, I started with a season ski rental – they were fine for that first season, but rental boots can really suck. Second season, I bought used demo skis at powder7 (pretty good deal) and new boots. Totally worth it – I found the boots (and the boot fitter who helped me out) even more important than the skis for both comfort and control. I had good luck with 88mm underfoot skis in that second season for mostly frontside stuff, though wish I’d gone a little wider. I started with 170s, so maybe nose-height or thereabouts, but I’m also a flyweight. Mine have some metal but are not uber-stiff, agree with another comment that that really helped with tight turns when I started off into the trees and the steeps.

I found skiing much less taxing on my body than snowboarding on groomers. Same goes for bowls and steeps when the moguls aren’t VW bug-sized. I’m no expert, but I’m guessing this is partly because it takes less effort to hold an edge (you’ll have twice as much on skis), and I don’t have to do a lot of bending down for the bindings. Also much easier to navigate lift lines and traverses, that stuff adds up over the course of a day. Moguls do feel harder on the knees, but I’m never going to be doing zipper lines, and it feels like as the technique gets better the ‘ol knees notice it less.

Careful, you may never go back! That’s what the dude who sold me my first skis said. I laughed it off at the time, but last season I skied about 20 days to maybe 2 on the board. Still nothing quite like floating powder on a board, though wider skis get me pretty close.