Brands...? o_O

Different brands affect different people in different ways. Bleh, what a dumb sentence :-P . But it's true. You have to experiment and see what works for you. However, a lot of people have problems with certain things, like home highlighting kits, which are very hard to get right, so that might be something to avoid. And if you're worried about damage, a lot of people say Feria makes their hair really dry, so be careful if you try that.
To get silver hair, you'll have to bleach it as light as it'll go and put some toner on it. There's a Japanese brand called Gatsby that seems to have a great silver, probably the truest silver I've seen (if it comes out on real hair like the box shows it-- haven't used it myself). You can find things labelled white or silver toner in other brands like Manic Panic or whatever, but the pics I've seen of those usually look more platinum than silver. Of course, with all the bleaching, silver hair will cause a lot of damage, so if you're worried about that, I wouldn't suggest it.

I agree SFX is great and so is a brand called Hot Shot (I believe that's what it's called I haven't used it in four years) but I died my hair one color and it lasted for ever. If I remember corectly they also had a great silver too.