I just bought one on 60 gigs for approx 300$. I went for the fastest I could find - a whopping > 200 MB/sec. Beats my HDD-stripe. My SuSE linux boots from GRUB to desktop in less than 5 seconds, including all the init-scripts for vmware and mysql and you-name-it. I can now feel how fast my computer really is - now that I don't have to wait for this antique HDD anymore. Performance is incredible. I can only recommend spending the (rather large amount of) money, it's a mind-changing experience. From now on, I regard hard drives as an antique medium, which is good for storing lots of data, but not for installing operating systems. btw: All this defrag speak - it always helps, because there are still read-ahead and similar algorithms, which perform better, when the drive is defragged.

I do not keep my CD's in "ideal storage conditions". They are in my home, with varying temperatures and humidity. None of the more than 5 year old CD's can be read. Thus a CD-R is a null device. I threw them all out and got some shelf space back. Memory sticks nowadays have more capacity than CD-R's, even DVD's, so why bother with this unpractical and unreliable medium?