To the original poster - you really need to test drive the newer models yourself to see if the improvements, which depending on your perception may be slight, but which do exist, are worth the price (whether new or secondhand) to you. If we're going to use cars as a reference point I'd offer my opinion that the Leicas especially are far more like late to older models of Mercedes SLs or Porsche 911s (less the electronics, of course) than the comparison in post #2.