We will be visiting Orlando in early Oct 2002. I am having a hard time following alot of the posts...what are the good areas to look for a hotel? What areas should we stay away from? We will mainly be doing Disney and Kennedy Space Center and would like to stay off site. We are interested in regular hotel rooms as well as 1 or 2 bedroom suites.

Thanks!

We have stayed in Lake Buena Vista, on 3 occasions, at the Comfort Inn. Prices for a standard room for October are $39 + taxes. Very good location - 5 min drive to Downtown Disney - and next to I4.
LBV has a good choice of restarunts - Chevys, Bahama Breeze, TGI's, Pebbles, Red Lobster etc and is much less hectic than I-Drive and less built up than Kissimmee.
The hotel is ideal for a budget location close to the attractions. In my opinion of course!!
Heck, I'm not going to spend over 8 hours flying from Scotland and saying otherwise

In July my teenage daughters and I drove into Orlando with no reservations and no idea where to stay. While I pumped gas my oldest daughter ran over to one of those "hotel discount & park ticket" kiosks that are EVERYWHERE down there. I was skeptical but she came back with what turned out to be a great deal - we got 2 nights in a fabulous 4 star hotel called "The Rosen Center" for under $75/night. This was about $100/night off retail price and even much cheaper than the AAA rate I later checked. My point is not that you should stay at the Rosen Center but that good discounts can be found at those kiosks - they look like a rip off but they have some good deals.
There are more hotels in Orlando area than there are people in South Dakota so the hardest part is picking one you like.

I guess it will all depend on how much you are willing to pay. My recommendation would be to stay at a hotel in the Disney World Resort. There are many hotels in this area such as the hilton, marriot, doubletree, and best western. They all offer free shuttle service. You may want to try the Wyndham Palace Resort, which is the best of the bunch of the WDW hotels. It does have 1 and 2 bedroom suites. Prices there range from probably around 99 for a regular room to maybe 250 for the bigger 2 bedroom suites.

Try Hyatt Grand Cypress & Villas
Very close to Disney & beautiful

I stayed at the Radisson Resort--Parkway in Kissimmee in June of this year. It is right off of Hwy. 192, which goes directly to Disney World. The hotel was great, the pool was terrific and we were only 5 to 7 minutes from any part of WDW. I only paid $59.00/night for the room by going to one of those Orlando Hotel websites. I'm sorry, but I can't remember the actual website now. You can try using Google to find it--that's how I found it. Also, you might look at mousesavers.com. This is an excellent website devoted to Disney information and great deals. I orgially booked a room at the Radisson for $69.00/night, which was the "mousesavers" rate. I just happened to check another website later and got the $59.00 price.

I have visted WDW two other times before this trip and stayed on the Disney property. I just couldn't justify the high prices at Disney any longer, since they had cut out some of the former benefits of staying "on-property" such as early park entry. The Disney properties are beautiful and well-themed, but they are getting way too high. We also used a rental car on this trip, even though the Radisson does have a shuttle bus. We preferred not to use that b/c it did not drop off and pick up as often as I preferred. We firmly believe that if you want to have fun at Disney, you must leave the parks during the day to take a break of some kind. It was easy to get to get back to the Radisson, and there were plenty of places to eat at in that area.