Well, I wish you'd post a thread on "How to Tell a Good Gun by Feel". Might have swayed me to buy a Savage instead of the Remington if I'd found something like that to read before I bought. Weight? Balance? Does the color of the plastic stock make a difference? What "felt" so right about the Savage vs the Remington? I believe the plastic stock on the Savage was checkered whereas the Remington was not. Does that make it a better gun?

I did almost all my research when shopping for a rifle on the internet. If you're going to help someone who wants to buy a rifle, USEFUL information is much more helpful than subjective "touchy-feely" stuff. Most of what I read about the 710 was a bunch of crap about how it "felt like a toy" or "felt cheap". Of course, there were no explanations about how the 710's feel was soooo much more inferior to the often-recommended Savage 110s/111s. What makes the Savage "feel" better than the Remington?

Other than Savage's reputation for accuracy, there was almost no other useful information. Some did manage to post that the 710's bolt took more effort to close than the Savage. Some complained about the 710 having a pressed barrel instead of a threaded barrel, but I can't imagine ever shooting enough to wear the thing out, so that wasn't an issue for me. Some complained about the lack of an all-steel receiver (my 710 has the nylon insert in the receiver - can't see that a steel one would make a difference...one less part to rust). One or two claimed to have shot a 710 that broke within a few dozen shots.

As for me, I was willing to accept the trade-off of the extra effort to close the bolt in order to get the detachable magazine, which the Savage package gun did not offer at that time (2004), nor did the package gun have the acclaimed AccuTrigger.

As for accuracy, here's what I got with some Federal 150gr Sierra Game King ammo @ 100 yards. I was running out of time, so after this group, I just tweaked the scope and packed up instead of trying to get punch the center of the target with another group. Rem 710 - Fed 150gr Sierra Game King ammo @ 100 yards