why is shimano xt so good?

serious question……how is shimano xt so good?
it has always seemed to have been the choice for mtbing, and is also the groupset that is specced for a fair few serious touring bikes.

fitted a 3×10 set up to my tourer a month or so ago. it went on the bike with no glitches at all, no adjustment to rear mech..nothing, and it is just faultless in use.

how do they make it so good?

slx is just as good and cheaper!

To be honest, I have always been a fan of deore. The setup I have on my Malt2 has been pretty faultless and just works well.

XT is shiny though.

It’s usually “last year’s” XTR, refinded after a year or more of warranty claim information from the XTR line up so it should be robust, but the same time it’s not ‘made cheap’ like Deore and to a lessor extent SLX – not that there’s much wrong with them, just they need to cut back on features and use heavier cheaper bits to make them affordable.

Real answer????

Good initial Engineering refined over a number of iterations by intelligent and logical Engineers.

Simple innit 😛

Nowhere near as impressed with the M8000 groupset as the previous couple of XT generations. 1×11 tolerances seem tight, even when set-up perfectly gear change is notchy, chain line isn’t right resulting in noisy, notchy low gears and back pedal gear change, after two rides crank arms looked about 3 years old etc. Also M8000 brakes don’t seem like an improvement on the last generation. In fact there have been numerous people reporting that they pump up, even when bled to perfection – a problem I’ve also experienced.

If you remember the days before XTR was invented, which I suspect you do ton, then I think it’s just hard wired into our brains to want XT on our bikes.

Shimano sell tons of kit as there are too many other options so I suppose they have the luxury of economies of scale.

Even when their stuff had competion that was often superior, most people would by default still just buy Shimano.

Well, at least on the 1x11s front I think SRAM have kept their edge: the M8000 transmission seems lackluster and belated.

Nowhere near as impressed with the M8000 groupset as the previous couple of XT generations. 1×11 tolerances seem tight, even when set-up perfectly gear change is notchy, chain line isn’t right resulting in noisy, notchy low gears and back pedal gear change, after two rides crank arms looked about 3 years old etc.

I thought this, but mine seems to be “wearing in” a bit now.

Time will tell…

Still no issues with my M8000 stuff here.

Have to say that XT is my default option, especially since losing trade discount on XTR (though you can usually buy it cheaper nowadays)

XT has always been well engineered first, made to look pretty second.
Its the prefect compromise between function, price and weight. SLX works as well, but the shifters always feel a little plasticky for example.
XTR looks nicer, but rarely works any better than XT.

It just is.

And for under £300 for an M8000 Groupset? Its cheap as chips too!

I read in the last ST mag that the new shifters are now only a single upshift (i.e. down the cassette) whereas the old ones had a double shift. My 9 speed XTR shifters have that feature and I really like it.

Why, Shimano, why?

I skipped 780 and 770 is single shift that way (higher gear) too. I guess I’ve never really needed it. Multi shifts going the other way seem more important.

Multi shifts going the other way seem more important.

with rapid rise dumping a load of gears was nice with a modded xt multi shifting in both directions. But yeah probably less of an issue with wrong way round mechs.

after two rides crank arms looked about 3 years old etc.

across the board for shimano cranks innit? And not something that I really care about – but it would be nice to see them go polished instead of paint/anodising that always wears off.

I buy my bike to ride, and groupset to propel the bike (with my input).
I don’t buy it to look at, and when standing on the pedals, I can’t see the side of the cranks.

I get XT because it’s a no nonsense groupset that generally just works, and doesn’t cost the earth. Anything cheaper is SLX/Deore, so even less nonsense. Almost everything else is more (other than SRAM GX, which is pretty much the same price, and probably just as no-nonsense for the anti-Shimano fanbois).

And my 8 year old XT doesn’t look 3 years old when the bike is up on the stand, and I do get a side view of the bike. Do people wear jeans that are too long and scrunched up around the ankles or something?

Yep that’s right Andy, that’s exactly the clothes I wear to go riding and hence why my cranks look three years old 🙄

I mentioned the crank thing because my 18 month old 7 series cranks on my other bike look almost pristine with over 1000 miles on the clock. I wear the exact same clothing (shorts!) for both bikes and the M8000 look very shabby by comparison after two rides totalling 25 miles.

Seriously what is the point in even making that comment that you can’t see the cranks when you are going along? You can’t see the wheels of your car when you are going along either but you wouldn’t be too happy if they looked shabby after two journeys would you?

XT default option here.

SLX looks the part but isn’t. In the case of rear mech, SLX uses a U shape piece of steel for part of the parallelogram with holes punched in it where the rivets acting as bearings go. The holes ovalises and can cause the mech to slop into your spokes.
For XT and above this is instead a cast piece of alloy with proper bushings.

I read in the last ST mag that the new shifters are now only a single upshift (i.e. down the cassette) whereas the old ones had a double shift. My 9 speed XTR shifters have that feature and I really like it.

Why, Shimano, why?

If its that big a deal and your going 1×11 the xtr shifter isn’t that much more expensive. It has multi shift both ways, however appears the up shift will do a single if activated from the front (finger) or multi from the back (thumb). This is nicer than the 9spd xtr which I found had a habit of multi shift when you wanted single shift.

^thanks for the info, useful.