Recommend me: Everything I need for basic bike maintanence

I have some lovely rubber spunge material the same as snap on make their workshop matts out of, it's a huge sheet though which I have made a perfect cut out for the abba stand to slot through. Keep a bucket handy for coolant and an old oil container with the side cut off it great for emptying the sumps contents into. I use old towls ontop of the rubber matt to catch any leaking oil etc. Keep a small pot tube of instant gasket and locktite now do a prit-stick type tube which I highly rate as-well. I've got a full set of 1/4" sockets, deep and shallow with a range of extension bars and universal joints, all sealey and great for those 8mm or 10mm bolts, I got a stubby ratchet as-well which means you can rarely get enough leverage on it to sheer bolts etc which is good for the ham-fisted amungst us.
As for the hex bits/allen keys, I have a snap-on selection that all fold out of a metal container, which when the allen key you need is out you can use as a handle.. it's good but not excellent.
If you can get your sockets on rails.. sounds silly but means that you can pickup a rail with 13 sockets on it and pick the right one rather than having to rummidge about in a plastic box to find the right one.
I spent ?200 on ebay the other year oin mine and got:
Full set of 1/4" sockets, deep and shallow (colour coded as-well [blue is 8mm, purple is 10mm etc]) with stubby ratchet and 5 extension bars of varying lengths.
Full set of 3/8" sockets, deep and shallow (colour coded as well [purple is 10mm etc]) with a normal sized ratch and 3 extension bars of varying lengths, also torque wrench for smaller measures of torque.
Screwdriver set with nearly everysize of philips and flat blade screwdrivers from watch makers to dangerously big, also came with a magnet on a stick with is great when doing valve clearances.
Set of picks/scrapers. [includes small strait, right angle, hook and offset pick; large strait, right angle and hook picks aswell as a large and small gasket scraper].
Ratcheting spanners (full set from 8mm up to 22mm, great for those areas when a ratchet just won't fit.
Set of small pliers, includes parrot nose, bent parrot nose, right angle parrot nose, small side cutters and beak type cutters.
Large set of pliers and mole grips (abour 5 pairs in total)
Gas soldering iron (removable tips can be changed into cutter or mini blowtorch, runs on lighter fuel).
Set of torx male and fe-male sockets for 3/8" drive (two seporate rails of sockets with 13 on each).
Flip out stanley knife with 10 blades.
Mirror set (inspection type, flexible one, strait one, extendable one)
Flexible screwdriver (about two foot long when extended, takes "bits" which are of the standard size).
Electrical test light.

Theres more but I can't remember it. It was a great buy, I use my tools every saturday as a part time job and do all my own car and bike servicing myself and none of the tools have let me down other than a screwdriver I was jumping up and down on trying to pop my wishbone out of the nearside wheel hub...
Really good stuff and some really bargains to be had. I wouldnt by the bundled stuff you can get that comes with a box because the box's quality is ****e and the tools won't last long either.
Cheers
Dan

[embee]

A lot of what the others have said.

Get an oil drain can, it has a draining panel and plug moulded into one side. OK you can use an old oil can with the side cut out, but I use the drain can all the time and wouldn't be without, very much less likely to spill it. Useful for draining forks into, put under calipers when spraying with brake cleaner etc.

Get a few good tools rather than lots of cheap ones. Really good tools will genuinely last a lifetime, buy once only.