Besides product "flaws" (wich honestly should be beyond product reviews), how do you know if you would automatically prefer the "best" bike on paper (reviews) ?
Yeah, reviews aren't very helpful generally. There is no golden rule.
I remember one helpful article wrote by Hunter Allen on his Cyfac Gothica bike. He described the bike as :
-not his stiffest, liveliest, not the most stable, etc. he ever had,
- Far from being the lightest either,
- But it was the bike that gave him the best times on hilly segments, with the lowest avg.power.
He also though it was generally very comfortable to ride, if I remember the main ideas.
You can also "adapt" any review, to your needs and whatever deal comes up. The brain is a wonderful thing.
Look at Rocketracing, he's happy with a crappy designed frameset, wich has very poor rear braking power, even with EEBrake, but he's happy with it. He found a good review, scored the frame, and obliterated the frame's major defect.
From Cyclingtips's review:
Quote:
One potential option is a replacement caliper from eecycleworks, which Felt sent to me to trial. That caliper was fitted with a specific linkage arm to better match with SRAM levers, and as promised, it provided much more rim clearance for a given amount of brake lever travel — enough that pad rub was no longer an issue, even when pounding the pedals out of the saddle on steep climbs.
The ee caliper’s built-in quick-release mechanism also eliminates the need for a separate inline widget.
That generous pad clearance came at the expense of overall braking performance, however. While the pad contact point was reassuringly distinct, power was lacking. Moreover, I found the caliper’s overly stiff spring tension to require an inordinate amount of hand effort at the lever, which felt particularly out-of-sorts when combined with the standard SRAM Red front caliper’s comparatively feathery-light action.
Louis :-)