I'm new to straight razor shaving and to the forum (obviously ha!). There is a lot of good info here...
I ordered a new dovo razor to get started and it came in last week. Haven't attempted my first shave bc I just want to make sure it was honed before I try. This forum taught me it's not shave ready from the factory. The place i bought it from offered it to be honed as a (pay for it) service but the razor was shipped the day after I ordered it. I've emailed them to verify but haven't gotten a reply (need to call). Once I do I'll go from there! I've tested the razor on my arm and it just seems to pull so I'm thinking it wasn't honed.
In the meantime I bought a $12 Gold dollar (I know I know) razor off ebay to practice honing/sharpening. I have a set of norton stones I bought a while back for knife sharpening. Figure if I can get that sharp I can sharpen my more expensive razor no problem. I may be asking some questions, but for the most part all the info is here!