Dear Mr Monkey Boy,
Ref hard luggage, last year I hired a GS1200 BMW for some touring with the BM hard boxes which worked well but jeez they're wide! I still managed to wiggle through traffic okay though but just hated the aesthetic of such boxes.
I've since bought by lovely ex-demo 1000 Strom and after endless tortuous internal battles - aided by Shiraz - I concluded I wanted max cube, but with minimum width, plus looking good too. After a LOT of looking (and listening on this excellent site) I've gone for the Suzuki hard - and slim - side boxes, who's only negative I've picked up on is premature lock failure, and the message is keep all the mechanism well lubricated - done. And at the recent NEC bike show I concluded the ideal top box was the Shad mid range expandable box with back rest and matching aluminium trim as the Suzuki boxes. This has big cube and looks great too. I'm really really happy with the outcome.
That's my experience - ask me after a full season touring and I may have another story - but so far - just a perfect combination. I hope helpful.
Dave.