Hard disks can last a LONG time if treated properly. Even some of the incredibly fragile Segate MFM disks are still kicking.
I prefer real disks, and I will hold out using them for as long as I can manage. There is no substitute. I dislike things like USB floppy emulators, CF to IDE converters, SD card readers in 486/P5 machine. I just think they take away from the system, and that if you are going to use an SSD for retro computing, you might as well emulate it.
I have a strong belief that part of using retro computing is the inconveniences that come with it. Like a find wine or cheese, it's the ups and downs that bring it to it's brilliance. You can't have fun without having frustrations. It's the more you work, the more you suffer, the more you wait, the more fun the games are, and the better of a time you get in the end. When you start to substitute the annoyances for modern convenience, it starts to chip away at that fine signature that makes up a retro system. If I don't take a cartridge and plug it into my Genesis, if I don't see the soft fuzz of the analog picture, if I don't have the feeling of the real controller, I don't feel like I am actually playing a Genesis.
This is why I heartily disapprove of pretty much all hardware reproductions. Unless it's LITERALLY a board for board reproduction of something, I don't want it. Even still, there is always the stigma of it being a reproduction, and that it's not the same as original hardware.
If I want pixel perfect, beautiful picture, and lightning fast load times, I won't use some improved SSD or whatever, I'll use an emulator, that's my too lazy to go through the paces of using real tech route, but when I do emulate, I still get a subpar experience.