middleburn rings were seen as longer lasting for a very long time.
FTFY. Shimano rings have been notorious for quick wear (never had a problem myself), but nothing else touches them on performance, Middleburn are shite in comparison IMO!
When people are saying things are “rubbish”, why is it that they’re rubbish? What are their faults.
I have a set of FSA carbon cranks which I picked up extremely cheaply.
Comparing bargains is daft though, because it’s only relevant to you. If you’d paid double the cost of XTR for those cranks would you still like them? What about if the pedal insert fell out (as they usually did), and the bottom bracket lasted 6 months. Let’s then also consider that they actually only weigh 15g less than the XTRs at half the price?
Shimano have a superb balance of weight, performance and cost. There are lighter, they’re far more expensive. Many don’t even touch 2 of those variables – XX is more expensive and heavier than XTR, as I mentioned previously X.9 is heavier and more expensive than XT. X.0 really misses out. A new GXP Ceramic BB is over £100 and IME Shimano last longer.
Race Face had problems with spiders cracking, and again the only ones to really compete on weight cost more, the Next SL carbon jobs are silly silly money.
There are of course alternatives, and many will work extremely well, but IME/IMO very few beat Shimano as an all round package.
YMMV of course.