Sure. If you want to backup your installed packages list, look
here. As for saving your settings, you'll need to transfer all the hidden files in your /home. For example (and this will also sort your Firefox settings), in /home you will see a hidden folder called .mozilla (the preceding dot indicates it's a hidden file, or rather directory in this case). As long as .mozilla is copied to your new install all your Firefox settings will be exactly as they were.
And yeah, compared to deb packages, RPM really does suck. But after trying OpenSUSE and Fedora recently, I kinda got used to it. It's all about having the right repositories loaded.
Edit: Oh, you might also want to backup and restore /etc too, since a lot of system configuration goes on in there. But to avoid the possibility of conflicts, I never do this. Your mileage may vary.
Just strange, that is a easy setup to & Ubuntu (the linux for human) doesn't have a tool like it. Think about editing grub in OpenSuSE (YaST2) then Ubuntu (CLI) makes you think right? It is saying it can't unmount /cdrom & I can't install. 
