searching does bring back more relevant results, and the option to seach PMs is nice and works well.
Real problem IMO tho is that when you search say "dynamite chalice" you get back just the threads that have the highest relevance. Usually its much easier to look up info (for me) if you are able to click on the page of the thread that is relevant rather than comb through whole threads.
I've found really good luck by just googling the key words with the tag Reef2Reef after it and I get back results with the exact page of the thread that is relevant. Particularly good for looking up pics.
The easiest way to see the difference is to search "dynamite chalice" in the R2R search and then google "dynamite chalice Reef2Reef". The Google results come back with specific pages with both keywords being equally relevent. The R2R searches do not seem as relevant to both keywords and seem to be highly dependent on date (although I think i can change this...). Searching titles might narrow your results but still won't give you back results that are page specific.
I do need to play around with it more, but I thought the inability to search specific pages was big b/c some of the best threads are very long and pic intensive.
Of course of lot of a searches ability to find things is also dependent on good tagging also and that is up to the user. Plus my research style may be very different than others.
I do think it seems to be working a lot better and I'm not necessarily saying it needs to change (i mean, using both google and R2R search gives pretty complete results back). I'll use it some more and give some additional feedback if any.