In article <4eep47$895@news.halcyon.com>, aubin@halcyon.com says...(..)

>I'll preface this by saying that I do not YET own a Leica, but I WILL >own an M6 and lenses when I can save the pennies.
> (most of a long and interesting post deleted) But I still have a
>pang in my heart when I handle real quality equipment, and I still have >an urge to rush out and start a whole new set of photographic >explorations.

You make some good points about quality, and good "feeling" equipment
being an aid for some people in making new (and serious) photographs.
I certainly photograph much more when I have just bought a new lens
and am eager to see what I can do with it (though, I recognize that
for many people, the equipment has little appeal or meaning - like
an average screw driver or hammer for the average carpenter, it is
"just" a tool). And I do have some attachment for my better feeling
older Nikon gear, and relatively little for the newer "plastic"
stuff. And, for you, Leica may represent "quality" on all its levels.
Having tried a couple of Leicas and a few lenses, my impression is
that, while the "feel" of the rf Leica gear is pretty well unmatched
- in terms of usefulness, for me it is vastly over-rated, particularly
when considering the price (somewhat like Cadillac cars and McIntosh
audio gear - more like expensive carriage-trade posessions than state-of-the-art user gear). I find the Leica VF darn-near impossible
to use, because it gives a dull-looking odd-colored preview of my photo
(the "feel"thing..), with framing that is hard for me to see with
my glasses (and which is hopelessly inaccurate, anyway), and with a
rf that is nearly meaningless to this user of bright, accurate, sharp Nikon ground-glass viewing and focusing screens and VF's. Lenses that lock focus when you approach infinity are a pain in the neck. Cameras that do their best to avoid being loaded don't amuse me either. Lenses
whose selection of focal-lengths is limited to a very moderate range,
and whose focus range is too restrictive also do not amuse me. And
lenses that require the use of separate VF's for viewing and focusing -
well, uh, this borders on the silly, IM(NS)HO. And lenses which do not seem very good at wide apertures, but have those apertures (what for,
if they are not very good - certainly not for focusing ease, as in an SLR) with prices that are multiples of equal or better lenses made by
other manufacturers...... Etc., etc., etc.
(Don't get me going on the Leicaflex line, I may never stop spewing
comments about a cobbled-together line of Minolta-Leitz-Sigma-Schneider based stuff, also selling for exhorbitant prices [usually multiples of the original versions of the same equipment].) IM(NS)HO, Leica is
a good example of the power of image over reality. (So as to spread
the insults, I will include as other examples the "Zeiss" Yashica "Contax" and "Zeiss" Yashica lenses, and Canon, which with superb salesmanship, has parlayed the truth about some good cameras and
lenses into the impression in many a mind that the very much lesser quality equipment that occupies much of the line is of equal quality.)
I should end this (before the bricks start flying), by saying that I would choose a Leica rf for those occasions when it is not only appropriate, but the only game in town: when silence is necessary or desireable - and there are many such occasions. And, what I find desireable (or detestable) in a camera is basically irrelevant for anyone else - choose for yourself what you prefer to use! (But, maybe, one could question whether one is buying the image, or the reality -
or the "feel", or the "useability" [if they are exclusive] of a camera system.)
Hope This Helps