OK, folks, thanks for all the input. Here's what happened..........
In the end I wound up ordering an Intel x-25M 120gb ssd. Newegg ran a black friday sale and I could not resist picking up this 120gb ssd for $165 AR and a free $39 game thrown in for good measure. Amazing price for this ssd.
Now I know that the Intel x-25m is not among the leaders in write performance, but all along I wanted a boot and program drive, I have a 1tb 7200rpm Spinpoint that is quite fast for storing my documents, music and pictures.
This is a new ssd from Intel and as you can see from the following review, is a very strong performer, right up there with the latest OCZ drives with regard to read and general performance. It's a shade below the crucial c300 series, but you'll pay almost $100 more for that drive.
http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/3682/intel_x25_m_120gb_retail_solid_state_drive/index.html
Before installing the drive I upgraded the bios on my GA-X58A-UDR3 boards to the latest (beta) bios which has been reworked for ssd compatibility. No problems upgrading the bios. I did have to reset the XMS profile to enable full 1600 MHz speed for my Corsair Dominator memory.
I then physically installed the drive, the X25-M comes with a installation tray which is nice. I connected it to port 0 on the Intel controller. I disconnected the Spinpoint HD and rebooted into the BIOS, changed to ACHI, and rebooted again with the Windows 7 install disk.
Windows installation was the same as for any other drive, I used one partition. Absolutely no problems.
After installing Windows, I installed the Intel RST driver and various hardware drivers from Gigabyte appropriate for this board. I also installed the Intel SSD optimization tool and ran it to ensure that TRIM and other ssd stuff was right.
I then did a few configuration teaks such a turning off defrag etc. I then turned off the machine, reconnected the Spinpoint, rebooted, reformatted the Spinpoint. I then set the page file to use the Spinpoint and turned it off for the ssd. I also set up a series of folders on the Spinpoint to hold my documents etc. I also set folders for downloads and other stuff I did not want on the ssd.
I then installed my core set of programs, making sure to point them to the Spinpoint to store documents etc.
Once everything was pretty much set, I created a system image and put it on the Spinpoint drive.
I might have missed a few little things in the above recap, but that's basically it.
All in all a very easy install with absolutely no problems. The drive performs awesomely, boot up is very quick, shut down take about 2 secs, many programs load almost instantaneously. (BTW- just started using Chrome, much faster than Firefox.)
WEI is now 7.5, my i7 930 is actually the laggard in the system. My ASUS 5850 scores 7.7 and the SSD scores 7.8.
I really feel now that I have a drive that can keep up with the rest of my system. I built it over the past year and the ssd was the last piece of the puzzle. At less than $200, the Gigabyte board brings me a 1366 platform (much superior to 1156, especially for running multiple graphic cards) the i7 came from Micro-center for $199, the ASUS 5850 is not the latest, but for less than $250 it was the best price/performance choice at the time, and it's a great overclocker. Corsair Dominator memory works great for this board. And I love the modular Corsair 650w PSU I used. The only build choice I (slightly) regret is the Storm Scout case I used, it's a sharp little case, the handles are awesome, but a little more room would have been nice. All in a all a very solid build with all high quality parts. I've got plenty of room to overclock the MOBO and the GPU (or add another one), but honestly the system is so fast, even running games such as Crysis on full, that I've not felt the need to even bother.
Even with all my programs and a few games installed I've only used about 28gb, so 3/4 of the ssd drive is still available. The 120gb size is great and honestly has all the room I'll ever need for a boot/program drive.
I would very much recommend the X25-M SSD, especially if you are concerned with compatibility and reliability. Intel makes a quality product and as you can see from the review, the 120gb ssd is a very solid, no fuss performer.
And it work just fine with the GA-X58A-UDR3.