Any one have any experience or thoughts on these pistols?

Thanks for your input.

This is something that I started writting back in Spet of 2002.  I'm not to overly impressed with this gun.  YMMV

A review of the Berretta 9000S in 9mm parabellum

I first picked up this hand gun about a month before this writing at Four Seasons gun shop in Woburn, MA www.fourseasons.com used for $375 LNIB unfired with one spare magazine. The reason I picked it up was that I sold my Glock 19 to a friend since I was leaving Massachusetts and new Glocks were hard to come by at the time, they may still be on the Attorney General’s list of non-compliant firearms.

I picked up two boxes of Federal Hydra-Shok jacket hollow points in 124 grain and 147 grain ammo total. I shoot a portion of both along with 300 rounds of American Ammo 9mm 115 grain full metal jacket. I also shot 200 rounds of Winchester 9mm 115 grain “Value Pack” ammo that I picked up at a local discount retailer. Below are my thoughts about this sidearm with this ammunition.

The firearm functioned flawlessly with the above ammunition; I did not have any fail to feed or fail to fire with 600 rounds from various manufacturers. Accuracy was best with the 115 grain bullets with the 124 grain next and 147 grain showing a wider grouping.

The grouping test was done at 30 feet at a NRA B24 target with twenty rounds of the 124 and 147 Hydra-Shok each at about two seconds per shot. The 147 grain placed the larger of the two groups ranging from the low right 7 to a low left center ring with the majority of the placement between the low right 9 ring with a few to running into the 8 ring. Only four could be scored as a center ring shoot. The 124 grain faired better in the grouping with seven in the center ring and the falling in the low right in the 9 ring with only three falling into the 8 ring.

The 115 grain rounds were used for a tactical run ranging from 75 feet to 25 feet. The course of fire was drawing, shooting, reloading, and holstering from behind cover, kneeling, and standing.

Some of the points that I don’t like about the gun here such as: the low profile slide that makes it hard to slide back, the stiffness of the safety, the difficulty of using the slide stop in tactical reloads.

Things I like about the gun: da/sa, decocker, no need to dry fire to take apart and the redesign of the slide release, the spot of red paint for the loaded chamber indicator works adequately for Massachusetts regulations.

The first nine rounds would feed into the magazines with relative ease though the final round was difficult to load into both of the supplied magazines.

Basic design pros and cons:

Pros:
Small size makes conceal ability easy, reliable double action/ single action with exposed hammer. The magazine release is far enough forward so that it can’t be inadvertently pushed. The magazines will spring out quickly when they are empty or full. The grip is the right size for a small hand.

Cons:
Slide is too low profile making it difficult to rack when the hammer is forward. This also makes the firearm difficult to rack forward from a magazine change. The slide release is to far forward to use when reloading a fresh magazine.