I prefer the M1 Garand to the SVT. It is a more solid, more robust firearm, and a bit more compact.
The Dragunov is a neat rifle, but performance-wise, it really can't hold a candle to the AR-10, so exotic looks and exclusivity are really the only things it has going for it compared to other DMR type rifles.
You are of course entitled to your preferences. However, while I really like the Garand, I would like to see you shoot some 200 grain special purpose bullets through it side by side with someone shooting 200 grain marker or incendiary or tracer bullets through an SVT. How many rounds do you suppose you will get out the tube of the Garand before the weapon fails? How many rounds the SVT? If you were to say that the Garand is a heavier rifle, I would not dispute that. However, 8 rounds compared to 10, a detachable box magazine, ready acceptance of stripper clips, muzzle brake, all these features of the SVT are objectively better than the Garand. If you add in the early SVT model's ease of accepting optics, there really is no comparison.
In some ways advances in technology spares firearms. In other ways it doesn't. The Dragunov SVD is an early 1960s development, which has no parallel of which I am aware in the US inventory of that time. Closest thing to it is the M14 I guess, if decked out with a scope. Even then, scoping a M14 has been an elusive goal, until recent times. As a dedicated marksman's rifle, the SVD has pretty much held a solitary place in any Order of Battle until recently, vis the USA, which has only recently developed tactics which employ a DMR.
The SVD was eclipsed by the MSG90 by H&K as deployed in the German army, but until then, it was the best, and only, such rifle in any nation's inventory, AFAIK. (PSL excluded).
As far as an AR10 (not the first generation AR10 as designed by Stoner prior to the M16), this is a very recent development which exploits modern metallurgy and production techniques, along with a design which allows for a fully floated barrel. In rested accuracy with quality ammunition it will shoot tighter groups. Even so, I would only rate as "equivalent" an AR 10 to the SVD, and "inferior" if one evaluates optics side by side. The hasty "choke" rangefinder on .mil SVD allows for much quicker ranging, and the elevation knob allows for instantaneous range adjustment. Windage evaluation and compensation on any scope is going to be the same, and not readily addressed in any purely optical solution of which I am aware.
On the other hand, if one has the time, and is shooting from a prepared defensive position, the AR 10 with a mildot reticle, deployed with a shooter and a spotter, will probably be better suited to that type of tactics than a SVD. If on the offensive, the mildot reticle and mil/mil elevation knob is not as well suited to hasty SDM marksmanship as will be an SVD.
It is my opinion that even today, with the incremental improvements made to the SVD since its introduction all those years ago, it is a contender in its role. Other than the MSG90, which I deem slightly superior to the SVD, there is nothing in US inventory which is its better.