Oh, Chuck, where to begin.....?
I can tell you today's Smiths aren't as good as those made 60 years ago. Watch, I'll do it:

Over-torqued barrels/canted sights, internal bore constriction from same, rifling that doesn't like lead, engraved (not rubbed, ENGRAVED) drag lines, stiffer DA actions/trigger pulls, shorter firing pins, poorly fitting grips, locks that DO malfunction on occasion, out-of-spec forcing cones, mismatched front sights on fixed sight guns, and so on. Not even mentioning the MIMs that many dislike & some people at Smith & Wesson also feels are not up to the quality of the older forged parts.

They're not all junk, far from it, but they are NOT what they used to be.
MIMs & CNC can involve improvement in certain areas, but.....

Sorry, couldn't let that one go unchallenged.
Denis