I recently purchased a new laptop. Out came the 500GB standard hard disk and in went a 128GB SSD drive. Makes it sooooo much faster!
Even my netbook sports a 64GB SSD drive.
I tend to use SanDisk or Kingston units, because I have in the past found them best value for money, but don't take that to mean other makes are not so good!
Some may say that 64GB or 128GB is insufficient for today's programs and applications. Well, you don't need to put all your iTunes and movies on the hard drive! That's what NAS and USB sticks are for.
A clean install of Win8 (yuk!) takes about 11GB, so allowing for the bloat of hotfixes and service packs, go to 16GB. This leaves plenty for apps and files, even on a 32GB drive, which is what my tablet has.
Don't forget, SSD drives are only available in SATA, the old 44-pin PATA is not supported (AFAIK). OP, make sure your existing drive is SATA before shelling out money. You mention a 60GB drive. I am pretty sure this will be PATA; but PATA or SATA, you can buy caddies to allow these drives to be plugged into a USB port. Make sure you get the correct one for your drive, though.