Are there any general methods for computing fundamental group or singular cohomology of a projective variety (over C of course), if given the equations defining the variety?

I seem to recall that, if the variety is smooth, we can compute the H^{p,q}'s by computer -- and thus the H^n's by Hodge decomposition -- is this correct? However this won't work if the variety is not smooth -- are there any techniques that work even for non-smooth things?

Also I seem to recall some argument that, at least if we restrict our attention to smooth things only, all varieties defined by polynomials of the same degrees will be homotopy equivalent. The homotopy is gotten by changing the coefficients of the polynomials or something like that. Does some kind of argument like this work?