It's an interesting debate. I was always of the same opinion as you.
To clarify re the pgm itself. Do you have to have the unit amended to hrc or just the card? As I was under the impression that the unit has the various ignition mapping within it but it's the card itself that tells the pgm what map to run.
I may be mistaken though. I've been advised by another source that in order to run the hrc card you have to splice a standard harness or run the hrc harness which then means that you don't have the neutral, warning lights etc.
So when Richard who I'm buying a spare standard pgm and card from said that when he had an MC28 he was sure his bike hadn't been spliced and when he bought a pgm from Drew in Japan that came with both the standard and hrc card the bike ran ok all be it with normal clocks using the standard card and temp gauge when hrc. I may be wrong but I thought the hrc card wouldn't allow the bike to run at all unless a standard harness is spliced.
He's not back from holiday for another week or so to clarify things. But if it's possible it would be great. And who does it? As to be honest we'd all give the hrc card a go for the buzz, but not so keen on splicing a loom and permanently lose the standard lights and warnings etc.
Does anyone have any experience of having played with pgms and cards and whether the cost of sorting this out is worth it in performance gain etc.
Cheers