The machining quality was good for the price paid. The trigger take up & break away was sloppy.
With the 6 Taurus mags that I used, it was never reliable. Couldn’t go 150 rounds without a stove pipe or miss feed.
I forgot to answer the OP’s question. I have 25 years experience shooting handguns and have owned many of them. There is no simple answer as to which gun to get. I can recommend a few that I like but they may not work for you.
I would recommend shooting any gun before you buy it and if possible, shoot as many as you can before you decide on one. Some people love revolvers, some love Glocks, there is no way to know if they will work for you unless you hold them and hopefully shoot them.
The other reason it’s hard to suggest something in a certain price range is, deals vary by store, region, and if they are new or used. Used is often a better deal than new but you need to know a bit if you are jumping into the used market. For a first gun, let’s stick to new.
All that being said, it sounds like you probably can’t carry it since you are CA. Correct me if I’m wrong but you are probably looking for a full size or medium frame not something to carry.
I would suggest 9mm over .40 or .45 due to lower cost of ammo, reduced recoil and wider range of loads. I have been shooting for a 1/4th of a century and I still prefer 9mm so don’t think that .45acp is an “expert” round or something to graduate to. 9mm and .45 are different. .45 is not simply bigger and better, it can’t penetrate as well as 9mm. I have done my own ballistic tests and 9mm really impressed me.
Anyway, Glock would be my suggestion but it seems just out of your price range. The Taurus 92 series is not cheap anymore. The secrets out and they command prices inline with their quality now. A new one is $550-600 near me, I bet CA is more expensive then Indiana.
Perhaps the best budget full sized auto in 9mm is the Ruger app-95dc. Get the Stainless steel version. I had two of them at one point and didn’t pay over $300 for either of them. They are as reliable as any gun made and are stunningly accurate during rapid fire. They are not what I would call “accurate” guns because if you put them on a bench, most won’t do much better than fist sized groups at 10-15 yards. The interesting thing about them (and this goes for Beretta’s and Taurus 92s as well) is that you can shoot them almost as well rapid fire as slow.
It helps to be shooting a full sized pistol in 9mm but not all full sized handguns will shoot this well. My SIGs are very accurate off the bags but during rapid fire they are very mediocre because of the high bore axis and grip. The stiff DA trigger SIGs tend to have doesn’t help matters.
You seem to be right about the p226 .45. I know his Navy seal edition 9mm and the .357 sig is p226. They were in the same exact blue case and looked identical, but Im not a .45 fanboy so I was more interested in the 9 and the 357
The P220 (.45) and P226 look almost identical, the only readily apparent difference being the hole in the front of them 
the HK USP 9mm? It’s $600 for a used model ($1,000 new) and more reliable compared to the other two I’m familiar with like the Glock 19 and Sphinx 3000.
Unfortunately (well, fortunately for me) I don't know much about CA laws. I believe a lot of online gun shops will either sell two different versions of a semi-auto, one with standard mags and another with 10 rnd mags for CA, or they will swap out the mags to 10 rounders before shipping it out (or just not include any mags at all). It looks like Tristar doesn't have 10 round mags. There is some compatibility with CZ magazines, but I don't know if they have 10 rounders either. Yay for CA laws making it harder to find a good affordable gun.
So for this reason, I would recommend looking at a S&W M&P 9mm, a Glock, or a Springfield XD 9mm. You have to hold them in your hand though to see what fits best.
For gun deals I would recommend www.slickguns.com. If you want to buy used instead, you can check out www.armslist.com as well.
Mec-Gar make 10-round mags for the CZ (Mec-Gar makes mags for CZ). Tri-Star CZ clones accept CZ-75 magazines just fine.
When strange sound awakes you at night you don’t want to search for a flashlight(no matter how bright it is) you will just want to grab a pistol(location - somewhere on the reach of your hand) and investigate.
I strongly recommend this combination(flashlight/laser) for your XD.
And don’t use cheap cr123 for this.
But of course for guys that can not use pistol something like BTU shocker will scare the hell out of the thieves
I bought the cheap lights for my pistols. The one on my Ruger SR22 is the P05 from Fast Tech and the one on my Glock 19 is one from ebay. But I agree that the Stream Lights are really nice for the money. I paid $18 for the P05 and $28 for the noname one on the Glock. Haven’t tested them on the gun to see if they can handle the recoil yet though. I think the one on the Ruger will be alright.
And those cheap ones works good when you rewire them and pot electronics all that in combination with well balanced emitter that has good power/current consumption ratio. I had seen 15$ modded on on fully auto rifle holding more than 500 rounds(and probably still working).
I recommend XP-E2 because it will have excellent throw performance(clear identifying of your target on more than 50 meters) with useful spill, all that with low current consumption (1,0-1,5A is ideal for this small guy).
Any good place to buy holsters for flashlight/pistol combination? I mean budget holster for this flashlight/pistol combination?
you can never go wrong with a revolver from ruger or any name brand company…just make sure that the caliber is big enough to do what you want it to do…don’t go with anything smaller than a .357…the object is to put a man or two down not just wound…a revolver has several advantages one of which it never needs loading…you can keep 5 rds. in a 6 shot revolver with the empty chamber under the hammer…you can drop it a thousand times and it will never go off and kill somebody…you never have to check to see if one is in the chamber…you just pull the trigger and the cylinder rotates one into the firing position…when the hammer falls so does the intruder…you can always buy an 8 rd. taurus or smith and wesson if you feel you need more firepower although you may only find them used as i am not sure if they still make them…
semi-automatics are fine…in your price range if you don’t mind used you can pick up anything short of a high end auto…ruger p85 or p90…beretta or taurus type 92…eaa witness in the five most popular calibers…45/10mm/40/9/38 super…any of these would suit your needs just fine…