Diamond Select Toys Star Trek USS Enterprise NCC-1701 HD Model Starship - Perfect for Collectors & Sci-Fi Fans Display

I bought this for my son, who is now going through all of the Star Trek series for the first time. Okay, okay -- it's partially for me as well. I have not seen any of the assembly problems that seem to have plagued previous releases, such as excessive glue or large gaps in the seams. The only nits that I have to pick are 1) that the plugs for the screws that hold the secondary hull together stick out instead of being flush with the hull surface, 2) the marker lights on the saucer section are reversed with the red on the starboard side and the green on the port side, and 3) the stand flexes a bit much due to its design. Re: the marker lights, my friend's father is a pilot and taught me "Red, Right, Wrong" meaning if you see the RED light on the RIGHT side of the aircraft, then it's headed straight towards you, which is WRONG. As I said, they're nits, and I can easily forgive Diamond Select for them in light of what they got right.The toy seems to be very sturdy, particularly the pylons for the warp nacelles, which was a concern of mine, and the warp nacelles are aligned perfectly. The warp nacelles are firmly attached to the pylons and show very little flex if any. The graphics are very well done with great detail, and the "NCC-1701" on the saucer section is lined up perfectly. Despite my satisfaction with its build quality, I have still cautioned my son about not banging it around since it is plastic and he's still a boy! The best thing about this is that there's a running light mode! I have the NX-01, and it was a bit of a disappointment that this feature was absent from it. It just seems to obvious to me, so it's nice that the HD Enterprise has it.The other thing I like about this toy is the way the toy mounts on the stand. On the NX-01, you have to swap out the small battery compartment hull piece with a mounting piece that has a hole in it that's roughly 1/4" in diameter, which is where the ball of the stand inserts to mount it, which allows it to swivel on the stand. Without the stand, there's this big, gaping hole on the ventral side of the hull. On the HD NCC-1701, there's a mounting cylinder that the ball/socket joint to the stand, and it has a small keyed stud that's about 1/8" in diameter that goes into the ventral side of the secondary hull. Without the stand, there's still a small hole, but it's unobtrusive. It does come with a secondary battery cover without any hole, but oddly enough, it does not have the same graphics. I'm going to leave the mounting cover on since it looks great even with the hole. The only complaint I have is that the mounting stud fits VERY tightly, and it took a good amount of coaxing to remove it from the secondary hull. Then again, my plan is to hang the starships from my son's ceiling when he's not playing with that particular ship, so this isn't much of an issue.UPDATE: We have now acquired a number of the Art Asylum/Diamond Select starships, and I have come to the conclusion that the stands simply suck. While the ball/socket joint is great in concept, it sucks in implementation. The plastic from which the stands are made is simply too weak for this design. Even being extremely careful when removing the stand from the starship, 3 of the stands' ball have twisted off. This IS a toy and is meant to be played with, so there shouldn't be any expectation that it be put on a shelf and left there. Even with the additional cylinder piece between the ball joint and ship, it still managed to twist off. I guess this pushes up my plan to hang the ships from the ceiling...With the lights on, the marker lights blink, and the Bussard collectors slowly phase from red to yellow simulating the rotation seen on the TV series. There is very little light bleed through even with the bright white LEDs on the bridge and navigation dome. The lights also function with the dialog clips.If you're looking for a perfect reproduction of the Enterprise without any flaws, then you're probably better off buying a model and building/painting/lighting it yourself. If you're looking for a well-built toy that has great detail, is a faithful reproduction of this iconic starship, and is something that you would be proud to show your friends even if you plan to put it on the shelf, then you'll definitely want to get this. I considered buying the smaller starship models by Hot Wheels or Furata for my son, but they are still a little more than half the price of the Diamond Select line while a much smaller product. I think the Diamond Select line provides much more bang for the buck with the lights, sound effects, and larger size.