I got the Sako a few years back, at the same time I ordered a virgin 700 action (which I had planned to use for my future 6.5-284). They came in, and just for the heck of it I rooted around in the back of the store for a 700 barrel. I found one in a big bin, same chambering as the A7, all beat up and scratched, sitting there for 30 years, so I blew out the spider webs, screwed it on and headspaced it, dropped it in a tupperware stock and took the 2 rifles out to shoot.
The first 3 shots (4895/150) out of the "FrankenRemington" all overlapped each other at 100. The second load out of the still hot barrel (varget/150) was a hair tighter. At that point I stopped and left it alone. Meanwhile I laboriously and slowly began breaking in the Sako. Eventually, after 2 trips to the range and countless shoot-clean-shoot procedures it was ready to try for accuracy. With high expectations I shot a 3" group. a 4" group. As the day went on and my expectations dropped, the 2.5" groups started looking good. Then I took out the Frankenremington again and shot another sub .5" group......
Two things I noticed about the Sako right away that I did not like were the flimsy forend, which could be pinched to the barrel with slight pressure, and the bases which seemed very cheap and slightly under spec. So we'll see how the new bases do.
But all things considered, I found it telling that this expensive Sako with a full barrel break in, carefully tailored ammo, trigger job, and kid - glove coddling could not get it's prissy self to shoot even close to a hacked together 700 with a bashed barrel dating to the Reagan years, a mismatched tupperware stock, and ammo generically loaded to book spec with nothing special done.
As far as I'm concerned, Beretta has changed the companies reputation from "Sako" to "Carcano".