I'm looking for sci fi recommendations to read. I've burned out my current collection of books and am looking for something new, but nothing jumped out at me on my last few trips to the bookstore.

Can anyone recommend a good hard sci-fi series for me? I won't turn down any recommendation out of hand, but ideally i'd like:

-Hard or semi-hard science fiction
-A big operatic plot, with lots of characters and socio-political elements
-A series (I'm imagining 1,000+ pages across all volumes)
-Post 1970's writing

I've been badly disappointed with my recent book choices lately (most recently, I really thought that The Diamond Age would be almost as good as Snow Crash...), and so rather than take another stab at it myself I'm reaching out for suggestions.

Have you tried any Peter F Hamilton yet? Start with Nights Dawn or the Commonwealth Saga - big doorstoppers of books, the science may not be as hard as you'd like (and the mystical elements may be a little offputting, but I believe if you stick with it you'll be rewarded), otherwise ticks all the right boxes.

i'd recommend the chaos walking series by Patrick Ness. It was an absolute fantastic read imo. The science fic isn't probably as hard as you want, but it was still great imo.

Not real science fiction, but George Orwell - 1984. Real masterpiece. It has a lot of true.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Tour_(novel_series)

Not quite a continuous plot, though.

Have you read anything by Frederik Pohl? I haven't read much, but I've enjoyed what I have. I particularly recommend The World at the End of Time.

The Saga of the Seven Suns series by Kevin J Anderson

A conflict between human and alien empires, space travel, ancient civilisations, robotic beetles, the destruction of star systems, teleporters, betrayal, love and other such stuff.

If you want old school, I'd still recommend most stories by Isaac Asimov and The Lensman books by E E Doc Smith

Enjoy!

Pohl is a great recommendation but I don't think he meets all of the OP's requirements exactly. Despite that Gateway is essential reading for anyone, and the Gold at the Starbow's End is a classic.

Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy also springs to mind - it's hard as a diamond, big in scope, lots of the socio-political stuff and spans 3 quite chunky books.

I recommend Vernor Vinge. All of his stuff is pretty hard sci fi. The Peace War, Marooned in Realtime, A Fire Upon the Deep, and A Deepness in the Sky all have politic machinations in them to various degrees. The Peace War and Marooned in Realtime are set in the same universe although not directly connected. The same is true of A Fire Upon the Deep and A Deepness in the Sky.

Can I get some advice on flaccid or floppy sci-fi?

The Demolished Man was the best sci fi I ever read, written in the 50s I think, it was great, the Justice Computer was so powerful it filled an entire skyscraper ;)