90% of Galaxy NOTE's have "bad" emmc [hardware] states (incl. S2 and US Galaxy variants).

ALL Samsung ICS kernels (for N7000/i9220) including official and leaks have the emmc (superbrick) bug.

There's been a ~15% cases of bricks, so you can still wipe and use it, but you'll be tempting fate. And Samsung won't cover your warranty either.

Its just logical to use the Safe-TouchWizz kernels (CF, SpeedMod, Franco). They're all equal in terms of stability, but I prefer Franco r5 because you can choose a decent governer (pegasuq, lulzactiv, smartassV2, ondemand) and OC and UV slightly (you cannot on r6.

For aosp kernels, the CM9 nightlies have been great. Thor is overrated, until I tried his new v15 which is leaps and bounds better than his v11/v12/v13. So thor v15 > CM9 kernel >> thor v13etc etc