[araine901]

the 1911 is my favorite. it fits my hand just right and is darn fun to shoot. I have a few, The problem is they are like old Porsches and need to be loved and treated with care to allways work well. When I take a newbie shooting I let them shoot my Ruger MKII .22 pistol to get used to shooting without having to manage a kick or muzzle flash. and for $200 its just a darn good deal. Fun to shoot and cheap.

If you are looking for pure simplicity Glock is the way to go. No safites to worry about just point and shoot. I personly hated my glock and sold it. I could never come to grips with that damn trigger system. Others love it, and I did grow up in 1911's and the feel is much different. My favorite of the plastic guns is a HK USP .40 Pleasant to shoot and super acurate. It groups just as nice as my $1500 1911. The other good thing about the glock is it is nearly indusructable.

Sigs are also a fine weapon. I cant think of any thing bad about them. Berrettas are fine but I have small hands and have a hard time fitting it to my hand. So I stick with Berrtta shotguns instead.

If you do a glock you may want to stick with .40 or less. I had a 21 (I love .45) and the grip was huge. I had it reduced by a pro and it was much better, but that trigger.

The best thing to do is go to a range that has rentals and try a few out. Find out what caliber you want and go from there. .40 is hard to beat. Both 9mm and .45 were desinged a long time ago and have served well. But the .40 was desinged to be a hollow point round in defencive shooting from the outset.

That was my 2 cents.

As far as 1911's

Kimber and Springfield are the two that make really nice guns for a great price. You will need to feel them in your hand to know what you want. THe Kimber 30LPI checkering was just too "soft" for what I was looking for so I went with Springfield beucase they do 20LPI. Its tough to beat a "loaded" springfiled. But Some of those Kimbers are damn nice.