I have a conundrum…I’m feeling a bit flush today so i’m finally going fully 10speed!
I already have XT M785 2x10front mech and cranks and XT M780 shifters, so….

Should I go for a Shimano XT M781 10sp Shadow rear mech or for £3 more Should I buy the SLX M675 10sp Shadow plus? …… 😕

I’d go for the plus, depends whether you value a quiet drivetrain with no chainslap or having xt rather than slx written on your mech though I guess

Having used shadow plus recently on one bike, I’m looking to change all bikes to shadow plus in time. As mentioned above its nice to have a quiet drivetrain. As for SLX its good stuff now and is making XT very nervous.

Thanks for the reply

Dont mind SLX atall, currently running a Deore 9sp and i’m impressed with that. I just dont know which is better for the money… (and dont want to pay the extra £30 for the XT shadow plus)

Having just gone 10-speed myself, I’d get the clutch without a shadow of doubt (see what I did there? 😉 ).

So much quieter and the chain feels much more secure.

right decision made then 🙂

Next question. Is an XT M771 Cassette worth the extra £20 over the SLX Hg62 ?

After reading too many horror stories on here i was my new SLX Shadow + for a non-shadow XTR.

Shadow plus. After having one, I’d not go back.

Not a lot to say about cassettes really. Generally the more you spend the lighter they are. Is £20 worth it to save a few grams, functionality will be similar. I went for XT to match the full XT setup I upgraded to on one bike but I also have the SLX on another bike – works fine.

The XT has more sprockets on the alloy carrier I think, which in theory should be better for your free hub if you have an alloy one. I’ve found the lighter ones tend to have more space for mud to escape.

Cassettes are one of the cheaper ways of saving (rotating, ish) weight on the bike, so I can usually justify XT to myself.

Cassettes are one of the cheaper ways of saving (rotating, ish) weight on the bike, so I can usually justify XT to myself.

good point / excuse hehe, though if i stopped eating too many pies i would see better weight reduction than the SLX XT weight difference… 😆

think i’ll stick with the XT to match the rest of the groupset 🙂

SLX still has bushings for the jockeys I think while XT gets bearings.

Personally, clutchy all the way. Less useful on a dual setup than a 1×10, mind, but I reckon it’s still worth it.

I generally go XT on the cassette as find the cheaper ones tend to hold the mud more and are harder to clean.

CRC have an older SLX cassette going cheap here

Jay

I could feel the difference between a deore cassette and a xt cassette. Skipped SLX out though, so I can’t comment.