I haven't rode the previous gens, but i did get to ride a current one at a Honda demo day. That exhaust note when VTEC (kicked in yo!) was Legend..wait for it...dary. Legendary.
I liked everything about it and after stepping off an FZ09 every other motor is pretty much 'meh' in terms of brutal acceleration so i'm all about the other things (sound, tech, comfort, etc)
I haven't done much hunting, but hopefully there's a low slung (under bodyish) exhaust available..i'd like to show off that single sided swing arm in all it's glory.