Sharing Mac iTunes library with Windows PC (I want to be able to read/write)

Greetings from a new Mac user. I recently purchased a 27" iMAC running OS X 10.7.3. This iMac is now connected to my home network/workgroup.
- I want to build a new iTunes Library on my 1TB internal Mac HD.
- I want my 3 non Mac Machines (1 XP Prof and 2 Windows 7 Home) to be able to view the contents of my new (not yet built) iTunes Library resident on my iMac and of course be able to
- play that content.
- have play counts from my Windows-based be saved back to my iTunes Library.
- be able to rate a song from any computer (Mac or Windows) within this iTunes Library and have that rating saved back to this iTunes Library.
I don't want to have to rely on iTunes "Shared Library" function. In other words I want all PCs to be able to read/write to the same iTunes Library file.
Before I purchased my iMac, my iTunes Library existed on one of my Windows-file system external drives. The pre-requisites for allowing multiple Windows PCs to access/share/write to the same iTunes Library was to:
- share the Windows folder on the external drive in which the iTunes Library file was stored (allowing network users to be able to change the files), and
- make sure all Windows-based PCs ran the same iTunes software version.
Assume: I don't want to change the version of Windows iTunes software from the currently installed 10.5.0 version.
Question 1: Can my Windows PCs access and utilize the same iTunes library file that I plan to build on my iMac hard drive?
Question 2: What older version of Mac iTunes software should I install on my iMac in order to allow the Windows PCs to access and use the iMacs iTunes library file?
Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

Hmmm...  thanks for the reply.  This of course, yields another question.  When you say 'you could format to FAT32 which both can use'; do you mean format the iTunes Hard drive on which my iTunes music now resides?  If so, this would mean I would need to copy the music off the internal iMac hard drive, then format the drive to FAT32, then copy the music back.
Is this what you meant?

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