Seagate Momentus XT 750 GB 7200RPM 2.5" Hybrid Drive $122 FSSS @ Amazon

Seagate Momentus XT 750 GB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 32 MB Cache 2.5 Inch Solid State Hybrid Drive ST750LX003

LINK

Kinda lukewarm but it's in stock and no rebate hassle.

(this is the laptop hybrid drive, not the regular Momentus XT without onboard flash)

Edit: updated price. Amazom's price bot is changing it regularly so check the link for the latest.

I bought some of the 500GB version of this SSD-Cached drive starting on Black Friday, and then bought three OCZ true-SSD drives just before Christmas. These hybrid drives are pretty good - a significant performance boost. I found that only my quad core desktop was really able to take advantage of the full-SSD, the laptops worked really well with this hybrid technology. Additionally, these are allegedly fail-safe - if the SSD fails, the hard drive is supposed to keep operating without the 'Cache'. But I haven't had any problems with any of my 500/4GB models.

One big advantage is that they work well with Windows XP, as they don't need 'trim' for proper wear-levelling.

Thanks OP, I will upgrade to this 8GB 'Cache' version for my primary laptop, and leave the netbooks with the cheaper 500GB / 4GB 'Cache" I already bought
.

The 8gb of SSD only caches the most recently accessed data and programs. This invariably includes all the boot programs and any programs you used recently. If your usage is data-heavy, or if you flush the Pagefile when you shut down, then 4GB is not quite enough. That is why I have upgraded to the 8GB (I have a 3GB pagefile). Actually, the 4GB of my older 500GB models seems to be pretty adequate. Boot time has dropped to the point where I no longer feel like I am waiting too long. But I have no idea about battery drain, nor do I have any technique for measuring it accurately.

i've been watching this HD for a while, thanks OP!

Use Caution. There seem to be issues with MacBooks and it is one where not everyone has the problem. If you want to try it be aware and watch for this issue. Performance was good until it froze up.

I personally had issues with this drive in MacBooks. I had intermittent lock up spinning beach ball events. Many would require powering off the MacBook to recover. Sometimes there would be days between these events, sometimes there were many per day. In addition this drive consumes significant power in a MacBook, even when sleeping. I tripled my battery life by switching this drive out for full SSD. I also tried it in multiple MacBooks, the issue moved with the drive.

There are lots of issues. I did update the firmware and the problem did not really improve.

Read about more issues at this link..