Have you tried viper mode or one of the equivalents? I'm curious how it compares to vi. One of the things that I (as a long time Emacs user) have considered is to switch to using viper mode, even though I only know vi enough to edit a config file on a remote machine that lacks emacs. But I'm curious how it compares to the real thing, and if it gets in the way of ancillary emacs stuff (I can't live without stuff like "C-x v =" and "M-/").