My experience with gasoline Mules is that they are pretty much bulletproof. My father-in-law has had one on his ranch for over 12 years, and it's been extremely reliable. I think the Ridge will be just as reliable and much more comfortable.
Thanks for sharing your experience! I've had a Ranger Northstar Ultimate and currently have a Defender Lonestar Max. Both of those machines were pretty quiet up to about 30 mph, but after that, I've found anything with a cab gets pretty noisy. Maybe someone will do a sound test with all three...
We can thank Kawasaki for helping to increase manufacturer warranties. Polaris' warranty used to be less than a year, and they just had to bump it up to two years to compete.
The nice thing about decals is you can easily remove them for a unique look if you don't care for the graphics that come standard. I see a lot of guys remove the accent colors on the Xpedition and it makes for a nice clean look.
Cab space is why I currently have a Defender. I felt a little too cramped in my Ranger 1000 Ultimate front and rear. The Defender Max seats six very comfortably.