Buying your tablet

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I want to get a new tablet very soon after finally breaking an old bamboo tablet my dad bought me ages ago, but I have a few questions to help me decide what new tablet I should get.

How necessary do you find larger drawing areas to be while drawing? I'm more or less used to my old bamboo's dinky 6''x4'' drawing area, and while drawing on paper I tend to only focus on little areas at a time and make small motions, but do people that have experience using a variety of tablet sizes find it easier going to have a larger workspace, to the point that spending 200$ or more on a larger tablet to be worth doing?

What would an acceptable price range for a mid-range tablet be and what models would you suggest? I'm not looking for something cheap that won't last me a long time, and I'm not particularly interested in something oversized like a cintiq. I've been thinking of something in the range of 200-300$ for a regular-hobby tablet but I'm open to paying more.

And lastly, what are some recommended sellers? Wacom doesn't ship outside of the US (live in canada) so it's somewhat of a pain looking for places to purchase from them. I'm open to suggestions for tablets from other companies too by the way.