So I've been looking at a few SSD's lately but am undecided if purchasing one is really worth the price tag. When I built my PC a few months back I considered long and hard about buying one of the Intel branded SSD's but eventually came to the conclusion that my money would be best served in other areas of the PC. Recently I have been reconsidering my options and have been looking towards the Intel X25-V 40GB drive as a boot drive for my Windows 7 64bit. But I'm still unconvinced about them in general, the more I think about it the more I wonder if I'll be simply paying £90+ to have a extra few seconds taken off my boot and shutdown times. 
 
So I'm looking for some opinions from those who have SSD's fitted. Are they the revolution that so many people keep saying that are?  
 
Thanks!

From what I hear on Tested from Will Smith as well as other places: Yeah, it's worth it if you have the money to spend. 
 
Obviously if you're tight on money, don't but it because it's really only a luxury. But If you do have the extra money and you do buy it, you will probably wonder how you ever lived without it. 
 
Besides the boot up speed, it should speed up file browsing and things too. So yeah, from what I hear, it's worth it.

Mostly, they will just affect loading times (this includes boot time). If you are the sort to rarely boot your PC, or you don't mind an extra 5 seconds on your game loads, then it's not worth it. They are also a young technology with tremendous amounts of room to grow (standards and features are still being set right now, so current SSDs, even the larger and more expensive ones, are hardly futureproof). Most people who have SSDs swear by them, but yeah I'd swear by them too if I just spent several hundred dollars on one. I think the money would be much better spent on a component that would more dramatically affect performance, such as a processor or graphics card. 

I would say not yet. Your PC would definitely be much more responsive running on an SSD, but I personally don't think it's worth it at the current prices. 

Thanks for the advice, the cost of these SSD's is still the issue. I'm sure eventually prices will lower (hopefully sooner rather then later). The X25-V is a tempting purchase though, Windows 7 takes up around 10GB of space so I could probably even get a solid selection of programs on it I use frequently which should help times. I'll have me a good think about it.  
 
To be honest I'm happy with all the rest of my components so don't need to spend any money there, the only component I've been considering is a blu-ray drive but even that is questionable to me. 
 
Thanks again. 

It would be cool to have a SSD, but the price is a bitter pill to swallow. You can get a 350gig HD for $50, so unless you're rolling in the cash it might not be enough bang for your buck. Is there any way you could get a 16gig thumb drive and run the OS from there?

"Don't know a great deal about thumb drives to be honest, but aren't they speed restricted so using them as a boot drive wouldn't work so well. Might be incorrect on that, sure someone knows.  "

Older high performance drives up to 16GB in size often use what's known as Single-Level Cell (SLC) memory instead of the more-common Multi-Level Cell (MLC) memory, thereby boosting write speeds for smaller files while simultaneously boosting a flash drive's endurance level. SLC memory is more expensive to implement however and offers less storage capacity for the die area, and over time has lost significant interest from semiconductor fabs like Samsung as consumer demand for larger flash drives increases. To make up for the loss of SLC memory, flash drive manufacturers have implemented a number of tricks including the use of quad-channel dual controllers and to a lesser extent custom drivers."
 
So if it slows down the drive a lot to read a bunch of small files, it might not be useful since windows is mostly made up of a bunch of small files. Then again, maybe with some of those new tricks it might end up being faster than a normal HD. I don't even know if you could run an OS from a USB port, but if you can, you might be able to borrow a thumb drive from somebody just to test and see if the load times are any better.

Nah, some ppl just buys one as the main hardrive for a new system and install windows on it and programs because it loads faster. Then they install a second or their hardrive are that 1TB hardrives for for games and storage.

Wait until you can afford a larger capacity. Some of that space is gone before you use the drive, so you will in fact have a figure closer to 37GB instead of 40. Official advice recommends you keep between 15 and 30% free space to keep the drive running fast - filling it up results in noticeable slowdowns in access and write speed. So let's say 20% of the 40GB drive should be kept free to keep it running smoothly - that's another 8GB off the 37, so you're now down to 29. Between 10 and 15GB for the OS install and updates brings it down to around 15GB for your applications and files which you will fill up fast. If you purely want to use the SSD as a boot drive, this isn't a problem, but I think you're better off saving your money and spending it on a larger capacity, faster drive like the 80GB X25-M, and having the luxury of installing all your programs on it (not necessarily your games) to really reap the benefits of the hardware.

Another thing to remember with SSD's is that they have advantages beyond just speed.  Reduced heat, reduced power consumption, reduced noise and vibration, and reduced chances of breaking (no moving parts) means that there are systems where SSD's may have more obvious advantages.  Laptops would be a big one, but SSD's that fit in laptop are still pretty expensive.

They aren't worth it right now. My friend has already bought two though. Yes, he spends a lot of money.

I would also say not yet, at least for my budget. The capacity to price ratio simply isn't there yet.

SSDs are great boot drives and great for smaller computers (Netbooks, laptops, some desktops.).   Not worth getting for a main drive until they get cheap and they come in large enough capacities.

I went with a 80GB Intel SSD, which made almost a 3rd of total cost of my budget intel core i3 ---/ MSI H55 GD --4GB RAM office PC.  I decided against 40GB version since Win7 already takes up 23 GB after installation.
 
The computer gets much more responsive, programs open more or less instantly. However i still need 40sec to boot Win7 it, also hibernation (or the S4 power state) doesn't really work with SSDs. It takes 2 minutes to wake up.   
 
Fast SSD controllers are the single most important innovation in the last decade. Quicker loading/responsiveness adds to your productivity one second at a time and it significantly cuts loading times, thus your total time playing a game increases.

Thanks for all your help, some great advice and information. It's much appreciated, right now I'm looking to reconsider my purchase and might invest elsewhere.  

Solid Snake Drives? 
 
HELL YEAH.   
Oh wait, that's not what this is?

I would say, if you have money to blow, by all means get yourself an SSD.  If your PC is lacking in other areas, but is still functional, upgrade those areas first. This isn't to say SSD aren't the cat's ass, because they are. They are just too expensive for a lot of people, which is a shame, because they are such useful upgrades. Running your OS on a SSD is great and all, but when it comes to loading up programs like 3DS Max, Maya, or anything from the Adobe Creative Suite 5, you're going to get them up and running in about 1-3 seconds instead of 7-12. And lets not forget gaming. You're going to want your games on it. At the speeds it can grab files, you'll never see a texture out of place or a model missing from a character's hand or head or w/e. Not to mention loading missions/levels would take a much shorter time, and when you're gaming that's what you want out of a load time.
 
The bad thing is they are expensive, but if you already have a relatively large HDD, you could grab the smaller sized SSD and not really think twice about it. Set your HDD to slave and enjoy the speed improvements. Don't save random files on it though as it will be unnecessary clutter that could be better organized on your HDD. Leave your SSD, if you get one, as bare and clean as possible.

I would try one of these first before dropping £200 on an SSD.