New/old Bandit owner here.
Well, after months of hemming & hawing, I bit the bullet back on November 11, hitched up my trailer to my wife's minivan, drove 3.5 hours (7 round trip) to Chatanooga from Asheville, and brought a faster red B1250 home with me - for $100 over invoice! $7164 - no prep fees, doc fees, or any associated BS fees.
RT Cycles of Fort Oglethorpe, GA (just south of Chatanooga) iz da bomb. If you live anywhere in the southeast, I highly recommend them. Family owned & operated since 1973, they are straightforward, honest & engage in none of the rip-off sales techniques practiced by my local stealer (MR Cycles in Asheville, who wanted full list plus about $400 in bogus fees).
I had a major pucker incident on the way home: as I was hauling the bike in a trailer after dark through the ungodly traffic mess called Knoxville on I-40, a car behind me started flashing its lights - I thought it was just some ignoramous P.O.ed about being passed by a minivan. Then he swung around beside me and the passenger rolled down his window and started shouting something. So I rolled down my window, too. Now its pretty hard to hear when your traveling at 75 mph, but after about 4 tries, he yelled really loud "YOUR BIKE'S LAYING DOWN!!" (I hadn't seen it fall over in my rearview mirror because it was dark & I was dueling w/ the 75 m.p.h. bumper-to-bumper traffic.)
I had one of those OH CRAP moments...several minutes, actually, since I couldn't pull off until the next exit about 2 miles ahead. Visions of scratched paint, gouged plastics, and broken turn signals filled my head; every little bump and surface irregularity in the road made me wince... but lo and behold, when I finally got stopped & the bike upright, I couldn't find a single scratch on it. Not a chip, dent, or ding either. It was miraculous!
What's embarassing is that it had taken me & a bike shop employee about 30 minutes to figure out how to best tie my new purchase down, and i thought it wouldn't budge in a hurricane, but apparently one of the cam-type tie-down straps came loose and gradually let the bike fall over.
Due to the weather and a hectic work schedule, I only have about 65 miles on it, but man is it smooth! and quick! I'm looking forward to breaking it in.
Now I really have to sell my '01 1200S - 3 bikes are making the garage a little crowded.