I'll throw in my 2 cents. Personally I think Brakes are really hard thing to get advice from others about. Pad compound completely determines how the car stops and reacts in different situations and people like different things. I liken it to asking who is the best looking woman, or what's the best hamburger joint? Anyhow, back to brakes. I have owned a lot of different BMWs over the years and done quite a bit of on track driving as well as other high performance events and here are the conclusions I have come to:

Brake rotors: For some reason the BMW OE rotors have been better in my experience than the OEM equivalents like Brembo, ATE, Zimmerman, etc. I know they cost more, but they last longer and are more resistant to warping. plus they are coated so the hats wont rust as easily. Obviously, floating rotors or true racing set ups are much better but it seems like the thread is geared more towards stock replacement stuff.

Pads: For a true street car that gets driven hard every once in awhile its tough to beat the OE pads. They stop great and have awesome initial bite. Down side is they suck on the track and will fade quickly after a few hard stops. Ceramic pads are nice cause they don't' dust but do give up a bit of performance to the OE in initial bite. A step up and still very street-able is the Hawk HPS. It will actually dust less than OE under normal driving and has a higher torque than OE so stopping power goes up a bit. They do give up a little initial bite to OE though. They can be used on track, but beware, they wont' last long and do fade as your skills go up (C student or better). from there the HP+ is a good pad to go with cause it bites harder, has a better thermal range than HPS, and is more resistant to fading. Downside is the dust a lot and can be quite noisy on a street car. I did run these on the street on my E30 M3 as it was not a daily driver and I wanted the better stopping power for track days. Now even with stainless lines, brass bushings, and big brake ducting kit on my E30, the HP+'s would still feel soft from time to time on tracks that were hard on braking. I was borderline needing some true race pads, but skipped as the car wasn't going racing and I needed some street performance. (can't have no brakes for the first couple of stops till the rotors build heat.)

I have mostly been a Hawk pad kind of person after having mixed results with Mintex, Pagid, and EBC. Lately I have heard good things about Cool Carbon pads for combo street and track pad and may give them a shot next time around. Also the new PFC compounds are supposed to be pretty good too. Hopefully this helps a little and doesn't' muddy the water more for you.