I remember when I was growing up my parents had a stainless steel ice tray, or some kind of metal. As a kid I used to think it was strangely dangerous

We use the Tovolo ice cube trays, but not the gigantic ones in the link above. I'm really happy, and I like their other products as well.

I have an old-fashioned steel tray similar to the one above and two silicon tovolo trays, one large and one small. I love the tovolo trays because they make perfectly square cubes. I used the smaller one for ice cubes and the larger one for freezing stock. The problem with them is that it's pretty tough for me to get the cubes out. I have to run warm water over the bottom, then use my thumbs to poke out a cube. I think this could be difficult for an older person or maybe someone with arthritis. It also seems to retain odor pretty well. I don't think I can use my large tray for anything but stock now. It's very easy to get cubes out of the metal tray, but messy. They come out as a mess of cubes and broken shards.

i used to have silicone trays in cute shapes, but they made my ice taste and smell really bad. and they were clean!

I've had problems with long term use of the silicone ice cube trays. They were starting to flake off into my drinks.

I switched to stainless steel. I love them! They are a little expensive, but they'll last forever. I bought mine through thetickletrunk.com and I think if you buy like 3 you get a stand that holds them all. I just bought one and it's fine. That link above to amazon.com is nice though with the free shipping!

Go for the stainless steel ones!

I echo the experience of silicon trays both smelling and tasting bad. I avoid it for most uses because of this, but the way it absorbs fridge/freezer smell is the worst.

we have both of those options and i have to say i prefer the tovolo one, one cube fills the glass and takes a long time to melt so not much to water down. i am not a fan of the metal one since breaking the ice into cubes is difficult and makes a mess. the other option would be wiskey stones since they are made of stone there is no water or mess to have to deal with and no watering down. they work pretty well.

Silicon ice cube trays are fantastic. best ones I've ever owned!

i love these from sur la table:

http://www.surlatable.com/product/PRO-567719/Perfect-Cube-Ice-Cube-Trays

I highly recommend boiling silicone ice cube trays to get rid of the smell/taste. They do absorb the odor from the freezer, but keeping them in plastic freezer bag greatly cuts down on this. It's an extra step, sure, but the majority of the shaped ice cube trays are made from silicon so it might be worth your trouble.

(Most silicon is able to go up to boiling temperature and much higher; I've only tried it on one brand of ice cube trays, though [the "Perfect Cube" ones that amylangrehr linked], so I can't verify that this will work for all of them.)

I love the vintage aluminum trays with the pull handles. They are awesome! My only beef about metal ice cube trays? If you have wet hands, they stick! Owie.

I recommend going to this site. They have an ice cube tray, along with tons of other stuff. Personally I'm interested in getting the popsicle mould. :)

http://www.thetickletrunk.com/store.php

It would help if I posted the site too...

I've got four of the silicone ice cube trays and have had them for two years. I would never go back to regular trays and feel massively inconvenienced at other people's houses, almost as much as they feel at ours! (Push the ice cubes out from the bottom, no it's not obvious)

My grandmother had the stainless steel ones and I never did learn how to use them without getting half of the cubes all over the place.

It sounds like the 2 options: silicone and steel, both have big drawbacks. Some industrial designer needs to make this happen! My desire is for something that can make lots of ice, not spill when being put in the freezer, and release the cubes with minimum wrangling -- someone go make a million bucks on this!