Yep those are cool but the only multi-barrel I want is a double I can hit quail with.
Colt...I'm no expert but I'll go with their less recent weapons. The 1911 for example. I don't have much praise for new Colt's. What I learned where I used to work was I prefer Springfield 1911's and that's where I put my money for my own 1911. The old Colt 70 series is a fine weapon, pre-70 too depending what priority you place accuracy. My friend I grew up with sometimes brings his compensated, nickel plated, 70 series to clean bowling pins up at matches and dudes offer him $2,000+ or AR's to get him parted with that Colt. The 80 series + Colt monkeyed with the safety/firing pin and never should have. Most of your new on the block 1911 makers build basically clones of the 80 series...food for thought.
The M4...lets say M16 family. Colt is better than most of the AR's you can find on a gun store shelf in the US (Bushmaster, Olympic, etc etc). Speaking relative to the 20 something other AR makers...Colt makes a product most of them pale beside.
But Colts M4 and to lesser extent their M16's dominate most of the US military's carbine/rifles. And with what we do with them, any quality issues become known. Colt's will occasionally catastrophically fail. Bolts shatter etc etc. It's rare, I mean really rare, but there. I've never seen an FN M16 (made in Columbia, SC) fail. Not once. Why? How come? Maybe we use more Colts so it's just higher probability. Or? I've never seen KAC or H&K catastrophically fail either. Maybe it's not fair to Colt for me to say that because those companies provide a fraction of our weapons in comparison...but I know what I've seen.
I am the biggest M4/M16 fan you'll ever meet. But if you give me an M4/M16, don't matter if Colt or other, depending what I want to do, I'm probably just going to put a LaRue upper on it anyways.
But no major manufacturer could be expected to keep up with LaRue...not gonna happen.
I believe when Colt wasn't just a government contract supplier they made higher quality weapons. But I'd still rather club you with an empty Colt M4 than shoot at you with a Kalashnikov.
On the Peacemaker and older Colts. Hell...in the 21st century a big arms manufacturer like Ruger is trying to emulate the characteristics of a 19th century Colt handgun with modern metals and production. If that isn't the biggest compliment to Sam Colt, I don't know what is.