With the fear of starting a nasty flame-war, I'd like to ask in a very humble way: is there an objective comparison between the VP and NATO armor? I have read some old Osprey books, but of course the theoretical war in Europe ended with the defeat of the SU. The American, German main battle tanks are clearly superior in computerization, sensors, range, but I'm not so sure the Russian stuff is really a pile of junk in comparison. (I've read in the Wikipedia -could not find any supporting source on it- that the tests on East German T-72 showed that properly armored the DU SABOT rounds did not penetrate the hull.)
What I know about: the gun elevation is limited, so no hull-down position, in case of penetration the ammo tends to light up and kill everyone inside, the autoloader has problems and the two-part ammo is dangerous. On the positive side, the profile is low, the tanks are light and agile ("flying tank"), and are able to use armor-piercing guided missles fired from the main gun, giving them a much bigger range than the Western counterparts. And many countries (even "Western-oriented" ones) use Russian armor.
(What I mean, I guess is that is it about quality vs quantity or are the Russian stuff any good? I was shocked a year ago, when I started to be interested in armor, that the T-34 was actually a revolutionary step in armor-design.)

Western tanks have greater survivability. Frontally, most of the western tanks can't kill one another, even with DU sabot rounds. You will find T-72s in western aligned nations for several reasons. First is the low cost. Secondly, many of these tank forces aren't assembled to take on similar conventional armies. And lastly, they do not value their soldiers as much as a typical western nation does.

Those nations have tanks to keep the population in check. It that respect, any tank will do so you may as well buy the cheapest tank that is still in production. Older rebuilt/upgraded tanks like the M48, T-55, M60, and others are at the limits of their useful life and are more trouble keeping up than they are worth. Former Soviet tanks are cheaper and easier to operate/maintain than their western counterparts and are a good choice for the developing nations.

Given the choice, I'd take any modern western MBT (Abrams, Leo 2, Chally 2, Leclerc, Type 90, Merkava 3/4, etc.) with a well-trained crew over a T-72, T-80, T-90 with a similarly trained crew.

I think what we saw in Desert Storm pretty much summed it up. M1 of the period vs. whatever Sadam had and M1 won every time.

Russian tank designers never really put much time in developing an user frindly environment. Most soviet tanks are cramped with little focus on the workconditions of the crew.

I guess the russians put there bet on sheer numbers - it worked in wwII ...

You see, this is why it's not a good comparison. The tanks good old Saddam had were export models, equipped worse than the ones stationed in E-Germany (go back, please, and read the part with the DU round). Also, they were at least 15 years older models. (Comparison: in the '70s the early F-16 models found their match in the MiG-23. It was a fairly even comparison. The MiG-23s now, with new, "digital" F-16s would be nothing but sitting ducks.) I mentioned some problems (which were mentioned by others as well), but there was nothing on the positive side. (Like how much mobility, small size, gun-launched missles, etc mean.)

As I mentioned, the example of the T-34 made me wonder about this whole "sheer number" hypothesis. It wasn't just the number.

So, are there any avaliable military reviews on the tanks? Comparisons?

How about the "Black Eagle" project? Ammo stored in the back of the turret, onboard computer, BIG gun, integrated ERA armor, etc.

There has been loads of military studies on this, but that's only good if you work for the military.

Perhaps the best hint for comparison for us laypeople would be some fiction books such as Tom Clancy's Red Storm Rising and PC tank sim games such as M1 Tank Platoon and Steel Beasts. (OK, enough with the italics...taking too darn long to type this).

In the book and the tank sims, the Soviets (or Russians, but often Soviets) come and come and come. It's often a platoon (4) M1s facing around 15 T-80s, 12 BMPs, and eight BTRs. M1s really run out of ammo fast! (OK, you're probably thinking 40 rds per M1 X 4 M1S = 160 rds...how can it run out of ammo? Well, if the M1 gets a track blow off, or an artillery shell hits an M1, or the GPSight gets konked out, there goes 40 rds!). There's just too much ground to cover. And if the Russians run out of T-80s, they throw T-72s and T-62s at M1s. If NATO or the US runs out of MBTs, there won't be M60s or M48s taking to the battlefields per se.

The issue is not destroying the M1 per se, but damaging it. In the sims, the T-80s have cannon-launched ATGMs that can hit an M1 at 5KM, well outside the effective range of the 120mm Rheinmetall. One hit to the M1s track or optics and that's a problem right there and combat effectiveness is greatly reduced. Now recall that these are enemy TANKS coming, not infantry or APCs or jeeps with ATGMs. So the best defense against a tank is another tank. If infantry knocks out the M1's sight, the crew can still kill the enemy infantry with their rifles. The M1 can't kill a tank with a machine gun. So when you play these sims, you learn to "never ever get hit" because if your M1 does (despite its tough armor), you might take damage. (I don't care how tough the Terminator is. If it gets hit, it still takes damage).

So the M1 manuevers for flank shots against the SU tank formation. I guess the Future Combat System is a result of all these studies (and I'm not going to discuss FCS here).

As said above, Russian tanks are often cramped and their ammo storage kills the crew if the tank gets hit in a vulnerable spot because they lack a turret bustle. The Russians were constantly improving their tanks too: (SHORTA, ARENA, ERA, ATGM cannon launched, diesel engine, etc) so fast that they made the West cringe sometimes (and drove the SU to bankruptcy). Now with M1A2 SEP, Leopard 2A5, and Challenger 2 Desert, Western nations are improving their MBTs as well.

When the SU fights, it's scary...artillery, waves of tanks (I mean WAVES), helos, airplanes, and often pincher or three groups converging on one or two platoons of M1 tanks. Try those tank sims; you'll see it doesn't really matter if you're in an M1 or a Challenger 2. It's marksmanship that counts and "being in the right place at the right time." Even in an M1 or a Challenger 2 or a Leopard 2A5, you can lose if the SU just passes your M1 by and waves "Hi...ba-bye!" You have to get ALL the T-80s whereas the T-80s don't have to get your M1 when attacking....they want NATO LAND!