There ARE different rates, but I'm not sure how commoners like us get them. On my last trip, I asked for the cheapest rate available and had a great CM who spent quite a bit of time looking for different rates. I could hear her muttering the letters as she tried different codes. One great tip: Expedia often has the lowest rate, and if you mention that rate when you call Disney, they'll match it - at least they did the last two times I made reservations. For example, the initial rate I was quoted was $200+ a night, but when I mentioned Expedia's $150 rate, I got that. This lets you get the best rate, but get it from Disney so that you can book everything together.
My favorite thing about Disneyland is being able to walk anywhere you want to go in 10-15 minutes, whether it's from a Disney hotel to a park or from one park to another. Definitely get a park hopper pass and you can easily hop back and forth across parks to catch all of the shows. Last week, the times were such that we could watch the evening Parade of the Stars at Disneyland, then walk over to California Adventure and get a good spot 20 minutes before the Spectromagic Parade, and then walk back To Disneyland and get a good spot for the fireworks. Try that at WDW!!!
I think the best place to stay is the Disneyland Hotel with a fireworks view. This situates you in the hotel at a point closest to the Downtown Disney monorail station for Disneyland and, obviously, gives you a view of the Disneyland fireworks from your hotel. The Grand Californian is closer to the parks, but costs much more. The Paradise Pier is cheaper, but it's a bit farther of a walk (although probably only 5 minutes or a little more). The Disneyland Hotel also has Goofy's Kitchen, which has character meal buffets for all 3 meals. The characters vary wich each meal, so you can do this multiple times and see different characters.
As I previously mentioned, there's a monorail station in Downtown Disney close to the Disneyland Hotel and convenient for the Paradise Pier Hotel. This monorail drops you off in Fantasyland, which, in the morning, gives you a bit of a jump on people entering via the main entrance. Also, there's a special entrance at the Fantasyland station for Disney hotel guests. This helps cut down on your wait when returning to your hotel.
Here's some tips for shows:
- The parade at Disneyland runs twice a day (at least it did this summer). The first parade will start at one end of the park, and the next one will reverse direction and start where it ended for the first parade. If you have small kids who like the Alice in Wonderland ride, find out which parade starts at It's a Small World. Then, right when that parade is scheduled to start, get in line for the Alice ride. You'll get to watch the parade while in line, and then probably get to go on the ride one or two more times in a row with NO line. No fastpass needed (or available).
- People seem to line up earlier for the Spectromagic parade. Last week, at about 20-30 minutes before the parade, the "front row" along the road was already pretty much taken. While at the Parade of the Stars at Disneyland, there were still plenty of spots on the curb at 20 minutes prior.
- For the Disneyland fireworks, Tinkerbell does not fly during the winter. In the summer, she starts from the Matterhorn, to the right of the castle. A good spot to watch the show is to the right of the castle, just as the road starts to curve back left around the castle. There's a little area with water fountains and benches. From the benches, you have a great view of Tink and a clear view of all of the fireworks. Last week this area was almost empty, even though the parks were quite crowded.
- Check the California Adventure schedule for times when the Aladdin show starts 1 hour after the Playhouse Disney show. The Playhouse Disney show is 20 minutes and the line for the Aladdin show opens 40 minutes before the show. So this schedule allows you to leave Playhouse Disney and walk up to the Aladdin show right when the lines open (you no longer get tickets to Aladdin in the morning as was previously done). The theater doors open 20 minutes prior, so you'll only have a 20 minute wait in line. But in the summer you'll still want to be first in line so that you're waiting in the shade.
As another poster mentioned, some Disneyland fastpasses allow you to hold multiple passes at once.
AAA offers these, but from other posts on this board it sounds like you may need to order these many days in advance. Disney also offers these, but make sure to ask what you're getting. We got passes with our room, using the number on the Disneyland hotels page, and did not get this benefit. At check-in, the CM said it was some other Disneyland reservation system that offered these (I guess it's like the two reservation systems that WDW has).
Another thing I like is that, I think since the resort area is smaller, when you meet face characters multiple times they're more likely to be the same person. For example, we met Belle at Goofy's Kitchen in the Disneyland Hotel and my daughter talked to her about starting kindergarten. We then met Belle again the next day at the Disneyland park and it was the same girl. She remembered my daughter, even her name, and mentioned how exciting kindergarten was going to be. We had a similar experience with Snow White on a previous trip.
Living here may tend to make me biased, but here goes. 
