My experience, not so great because i came from a brand new 2009 kwasaki zx6r, and compared the kwaka was much better, although the sv sounds real good with a good can on it.
power, well a good amount of torque for pulling away from lights or a cheeky overtake, and brilliant for powering out of corners because it's V-twin you haven't got as high a risk of power sliding our of a corner and risk losing control, but the power soon runs out of breathe once you get up to higher revs.
handling is brilliant for smaller country roads, especially for me the woman who had this bike before me was quite short so the handle bars have been dropped so it turns into corners pretty quickly, it's also a very light bike so it's good for round town as well, infact it's an excellent street and town bike because of the torque.
comfort lol well depends how far you travel, motorways are night mare's because the vibrations from the V-twin engine can be very very annoying and uncomfortable for a long distance, also the handle bars are in a bit more of a sporty position, but you can always get clip ons to raise them a little bit.
no idea on fuel consumption, it's not as bad as my ninja was but wasn't as good as my cbr600f i had, to be honest when i see the fuel light come one i just brim the tank and ride until the light comes back on don't really take notice of miles i probably should do.
things i would say to change if it was a standard sv you're looking at, the tyres, the standard tyres are absolutely shocking, go into a corner whilst braking hard and the rear wheel will try and slide out, same goes for teh front to be honest when holding a high speed round corners, that being said the sv has a low top end anyway.
for a first bike i can see it being a brilliant bike, but if you've spoilt yourself with a decent bike then come downto this, it's not a good choice, well not for me some people love the SV's and there's plenty of sv racing clubs and sv forums as they are so popular, all though i personally don't like the bike i can't tell people it's a rubbish bike because it's not, it's a good all rounder to be honest, just maybe not for journey's that are too long, 15 hours on one completely destroyed me.
P.S parts are so easy to get hold of as they are so popular, and modifying them is just as easy, some people street fighter them and some people track day them and so people commute them so there's no end of modifications to make it more unique to you.
