I have an HH Amex and am switching to an SPG Amex. I have come to the conclusion that an SPG point is worth 4 to 5 HH points; therefore the SPG card is better.

I factored in three awards: 6 nights high-end, cheap weekend mid-scale, and mileage conversion. In all cases, Starwood's card at 1 pt/$ came out ahead of HH at 3 pts/$.

Rough estimate (and I'm an SPG newbie, so jump in if anyone has better numbers) - using Starpoints for 5-6 nights at a high-end property in a location not well-covered by Priceline yields about 4 cents/point. Cheap weekends at midscale properties yield around 3 cents/point, which is VERY good for small awards. And we all know about the 20k -> 25k miles conversions.

HH yields are well under a penny a point. They were around a penny a point when ALON was 100k. Now they are down to 0.6 cents or so. Diamonds who can get no-blackouts in European cities will get more value. Silvers won't get rooms in those hotels.