A few caveats about how the gun community viewed auto pistols back in the day: First, they had no clue about ammo power, and thought you could stuff just anything into a magazine and it would go bang just like their revolvers. Nope, auto pistols require ammo made for auto pistols, and if it's lower power and incapable of cycling the slide, people then demeaned the gun for not working with it.
We know better now, and even a new AR owner who takes his rifle to the range and experiences issues will be cautioned about using full power ammo.
Secondly, accuracy. The S&W are DA/SA and shooters who compete in precision accuracy contests don't like the trigger pull being different. For someone transitioning from revolvers it seems kind of moot - the S&W has a trigger very similar to the DA trigger on a wheel gun. Nonetheless when compared to a 1911 it's usually said to be a "long horrible trigger pull" and yet in SA it's nothing like that at all. It can and will result in the first shot being put in slightly different place - fire them all DA and it groups, fire them all SA and it groups, switch back and forth and behold - it's a shooter problem, not a gun problem. However, egos won't allow that and once again the gun is blamed.
Third is the characterization that somehow S&W 3Gens are substantially heavier than other guns of similar make. Which is impossible - it flies in the face of physics yet keeps being repeated. Compare one with any other all steel gun in the same caliber and it's usually within an ounce. Alloy frames are lighter, and the shorter models are lighter too. A 4566 loaded is lighter than a 1911 full size loaded - yet 1911's are rarely said to be "bricks" that pull down your pants. It's basically no different than any other gun, what we lack is the polymer framed version to prove it. In other news, the S&W 2.0 is never said to be heavy.
What we are dealing with are the biases of wheel gun shooters in dealing with an American made auto pistol at a time when said gun was the #1 choice replacing revolvers in LEO holsters. We weren't buying foreign auto pistols to do that and the 1911 was already known to be inadequate in the job - so much so the Army scheduled trials to replace it in service after WWII. The S&W was one of those contenders and it reflected the new technology developed by armsmakers and foundries during the war. It truly could have replaced the 1911 - but traditionalists didn't like it and sales suffered until Illinois adopted it. That broke the ice on wondernines and the race was on.
All the bad news spread word of mouth in the day was as informed as the news about the M16 and shared by the same people. There will always be a certain number of traditionalists who will not accept new designs and claim they are incapable of being reliable or have negative qualities. The march of time finds them often vindicated - why invest the money to make a better gun and use newer innovations at all if they are always deficient? If so we should be celebrating the continued popularity of the Model 3 S&W Schofield. Mention it in some circles and you won't get any recognition at all, yet it was a major improvement over the previously issued cap and ball antiques.
Shall we compare the service record of the M16 vs M1/M14? Yet there are to this day fans who will not accommodate any view that the latter are less than adequate in this era of modern warfare. What we have are shooters who simply aren't informed - and as such, they are not adequately trained to understand modern warfare in the first place. I would put a lot of what you hear about the S&W auto pistol into the same category. It was negatively assessed by a generation who didn't use or understand the basic concepts of auto pistols.
Given a much larger base of educationed shooters now, what we see are S&W's being snapped up at every opportunity, and LEO agencies refusing to adopt any other sidearm, negotiating with the company to continue production when they have publicly stated they are dropping support and repairs. That is a testimony to how much the guns are appreciated by those in the know. They prefer this old jammomatic that requires full power ammo and is as heavy as a brick - give that some consideration when you read about CZ's and Tanfoglio's. They are selling well, too, DA/SA in all metal as they are.
