New bike on the way i will be using the same wheels for both bikes do i have to stick with shimano if using their rotars/hubs.

Theres £30 in it, i have XT's on one bike already and was thinking about trying the SLX, is there much difference in weight power etc?

£30 in it? on CRC SLX are £60 a pop but this doesn't appear to include any discs. XTs are £99.99 each and do include discs.

SLXs don't have the bite adjust, which i really like to get them feeling how i want.

On merlin £199 vs £169 here

i got my XTs off merlin, they don't come fully assembled and bled.

I have a litre of break fluid and built and serviced my xt's for a year, so i should be OK

I'm not sold on the slx, they feel a bit vague and need lots of grabbing to lock them up, new xt's are very nice though.

I got mine from noahs ark last year as I wanted a 180 rotor on the front.

erh, talking about "vague SLX", are they weaker than 535/585? I've been using them for 2 years and I'm quite a happy fit fatso (179cm/80kg) racing XC.

Noah's Ark looks the best deal as you can choose your rotor options.

Merlin brakes usually come fully assembled and bled (although cables are usually a mile to long!)

Ive had 3 sets of brakes form them (2 Groupsets, 1 just the brakes) Both SLX ones came fully assembled but the ones in with the xt groupset didnt (came with the bleed kit)

Maybe depends how busy they are, if they have enough time to set a few up.