Imo the minimum you need for a new dovo is a 4k stone. It won't be too fast, but the job will be done. A 1k stone would speed things up, but not really necessary if you won't be honing too many razors.
So I spent roughly a half hour on each stone this time. I noticed the 8000 had a much different "smoother" feel once i'd gone through the other 2 first as opposed to when I had first received it. After completing I tried the thumbnail test and it did pretty much what I thought it was suppose to. I dug in a big but also felt smooth. I stropped about 50 strokes or so and put it to my face. It still really felt like it was struggling to get through a two day growth. I was required to apply a fair bit of pressure to get results. Guess it's back to the drawing board as far as honing..