AE212060 that’s a mighty fine looking Yeti, never been to sure of the SB66’s aesthetics and certainly not the factory colour, but that makes me question both counts…

Some mighty fine component selections as well 😉

No changes to mine this year other than tires…

Controversial it may be but quoting from the Times on the 29th March…

North isn’t happy as Surrey named best place to live

They go on to say…

The tree-lined, rolling hillsides in the southwest corner of Surrey have been named the home of Britain’s best rural quality of life.

and…

The study appeared virtually to discount the northern half of England, including just three northern districts in its top 50 places to live. The list was dominated by the commuter belt in the South East, which claimed nine of the top 20 positions

In defence of Northern areas…

Nitesh Patel, an economist at Halifax, which has its headquarters in Yorkshire, conceded that its table
was rather subjective. “If we had measured areas of natural beauty, clean air and access to green space the
results would have been different,” he said. “But income is an important factor and unfortunately there is a
North-South divide.”

5 (including the bike I bought)

The old “just buy one they’re all good” strap line is so off mark as to be hilarious. If you know your bikes (geometry, equipment etc) then this is feasible, but IME bikes with similar spec can feel very different on the trail. If you’re going to off load some heard earned then a demo is essential.

Just make sure each is properly setup for your size and weight and in good running order.

Considering you can access the whole area from any number of local villages where parking is both free and abundant there’s zero excuse for parking in a sensitive location. OK as Variflex notes you’re technically allowed to but just because you can doesn’t mean you should; it’s one of those issues that could become a problem if misused and riders have zero excuse for parking at the top…

It’s the same with some motorbike riders which is even worse considering they have a bloody engine!

If you can’t be arsed to pay a small amount to the company who look after and protect the area then at least have the common curtesy to park somewhere else rather than force walkers, kids and pets off the lane. I’m With the OP and it’s true of any number of ride spots. It’s just plain disrespectful and lazy…

Jambalaya, if the fees bother you I would park up either in Haslemere or Thursley and ride up. The bonus is a cracking decent back to the car after tea and cake 😉 either that or Grayshott, BeaconHill, Hindhead, Grayswood etc…

Good idea FF, in fact you could extend the idea. Speak to the other guys on the street and organise a really good test by putting all [your] various wifes in one house and test each in turn, in several rooms (need to be quite scientific about it). For best results make sure the others are turned off otherwise the interference becomes unmanageable.

The one that performs best in a variety of positions is the model you want.

There? Where are you from, Yorkshire?

Edit: rescinded 😉

The way I see it is if I’m going to drive all that way (North) why stop somewhere where they have some nice looking hills and talk a little funny? Might as well keep your foot down for another hour or two and go somewhere really pretty, with proper big hills and where they really mangle the English language… 😉

Edit: before any Scots take offence I’m half scot myself and love both people and place…

Throwing a load of cash at it will have suprisingly good results, but only for a short while!!!!

Yes, but be careful here. You need to be quite subtle and can get away with it only once or twice, regular cash outlay can have very poor results leading to serious failure and regular outages.

There are two possible three times a year where targeted spending will have desirable results, anything outside of this is a tad risky…

Rather enjoyed that, liked the choice of music it seemed to fit the weather and scenery. Where are you in the UK?

LBS

Digitally Imported (DI) Breaks. Best dance radio station I’ve found. That, or radio 4.

Excellent as usual.

Nespresso

What happened to Cougar?

Hi mate sounds like you’re making hard work of this. I suggest you read up a little about RAID storage, this is a process that protects your data by using various forms of storage across multiple hard drives within a single unit. What you’re doing is essentially a manual version of RAID 1 or mirroring – creating a second copy of your data.

wiki on RAID

Take a look at storage solutions from Netgear as an example (lots of other brands out there), they employ multiple drives and redundant power supplies to protect data from hardware failure. If you employ RAID 5 (minimum 3 drives) any drive failure is covered and you simply replace the drive. If you’re really worried backup this as well but it shouldn’t be necessary.

Netgear entry level ReadyNAS

Not cheap but this is what has been designed to handle exactly the dilemma you have.

Galaxy S4?

Win for Lotus… Nice.

Rode a little in Aple D’Huez last year, lots of DH but not sure there’s a huge amount of Singletrack. I’m too old and scared to hit DH fast these days so I found it quite hard going, especially after I watched a mate get airlifted off the mountain 😳

Hi OP,

Not sure what your budget is and of course lots of high end options. I recently bought a Christopher Ward[/url] C11 and it’s pretty much replaced all my other watches (including an Omega). Superb value and it gets lots of admiring comments from friends and strangers alike.

Here’s two Motorsport themed options from their latest range and both under £500 😀

[edit] just read post to Pook and see budget is £500… Perfect then 😀

C7 in Italian racing red with metal bracelet

C70 in British racing green and leather strap

Oh my it’s like a trip down memory lane, far to many to add but some classics on here @ Chipsngravey and Rossi46 – very good indeed… 😀

Used to love the big all nighters. One of my all time favourites and should bring a smile to your face and get the foot tapping. Not the original record but the link will suffice, must work out how to imbed a YouTube vid via iPad…

Gamemaster – Lost Tribe

Cheers Scotroutes I’ll take a look at those links. Thanks all for the other comments.

I’ve been using one of these for years, no performance issues and the perfect form factor… They have a few options within the same design and top out at 32GB. Not the cheapest but baring in mind I’ve not lost, broken or changed it in over four years makes it pretty good value IMO.

Lacie USB Key

Takes money to make money and the more you have the more options to accumulate more. Question is where does it end and what do you replace capitalism with?

That’s about the sum of it… One of those things you can’t do or the workaround is too much trouble to be worth it.

What do you mean “use it on the PC”? You can only sync from one mashine, if you chose to use another you wipe and restart, at least I’m pretty sure that’s the case it’s been a while since I changed computers.

What exactly are you trying to do? there might be another solution.

QEP. I was rubbish, hard week had left me in tatters so short ride today. Trails were ok though. Relaxing with a bottle of red for the first time in what seems ages.

Denon. Frankly you can’t go wrong with any of them but the Denon would be my choice, Airplay, great sound and every feature you need. For anyone reading this with a slightly larger budget take a look at Anthem, probably the best sounding AV receivers on the market but kick in at just over a grand. Rotel always worth a look as well, very powerful.

Anthem MRX range
Rotel receivers

One thing i do love about most of the Denon and Onkyo range is that if you’re building a system with a control solution such as Control4 (one remote to coordinate everything), you can control the receivers via IP which is very fast and very convenient.

Have fun shopping Willard, let us know how you get on.

+1 Afan Lodge. Exceeded expectations buy a comfortable margin. Going back.

Bought my six and a half year old a 20″ Hotrock for Christmas and it’s just on the large side. Very pleased with it and he loves it. Gets the thumbs up from me.

Had my first experience with sram when lent a ride by LBS whilst my bike was serviced. XO throughout, I appreciate I have just the one experience to go by but it was so good to give it back, XT/XTR on my bike much better IMO. Nothing wrong with SRAM but I can see why some don’t like it.

Love the look of the Enduro, couldn’t give a monkeys about wheel size just as long as it rides nice. Totally agree with everyone’s comments about knocking a bike without testing, how anyone can assume they know how a bike performs without trying it is beyond me…

Will never forget JK being interviewed on some car program (‘stars and their cars’ from memory), anyway, he takes the presenter for a high speed spin around a race track in one of his Ferrari’s and, on getting out of the car, this chap remarks that that was “better than sex”…

… cool as cucumber JK just smirks and says “not where I get it from mate”. Ah Denise Van Outen, morning TV has never been quite the same.

Roverpig, it’s an interesting point but IME components define and tune a bikes performance whereas the frame sets the ride characteristics. What appealed to me about the Five was the way it felt when attacking decents; close to the feeling you get when snowboarding in powder 😀

I’ve riden various [2012 Five] builds and the ride or ‘feel’ of the bike is the same. When building mine I used XTR for chainset and gears, XT brakes (203mm discs front and rear), Crossmax ST wheels (currently with specialised 2.3 Clutch and Maxxis 2.3 Ardent) plus kasima RP23 and Float 34. It still feels every bit as great when flying down singletrack but just does it better. Astonishing brakes, superiour suspension, light build and wheels that want to just turn faster…

As such IME you demo a bike to find out if it feels right under you, then tune with components to meet your requirements. As an example I don’t believe there is any way you could make a Yeti ASR5 ride like a Five. Tested both, loved both, but very different bikes.

Had my LBS build up a 17″ 2012 Five with some choice components and it’s an absolute joy to ride, much, much better than the Pro I tested. Had a long service recently and LBS lent me a Whyte 29c whilst works were carried out, nice as that was climbing back on my Five reminded me just why testing is so important. Bloody lovely…

Never tried the other two but was torn between the Covert and Five after several rest rides. Really liked the Covert and as such would consider Transition for any future purchase. Can’t go wrong with those three but make sure you test.

Wow thanks guys, looks like a busy morning on Amazon ahead…

Somehow found myself with a ticket… Now to work out the detail 😀

Rustic (with a little posh thrown in) living Mexico. Lots to do and see, very romantic and not too £££. This is where we stayed in Tulum.

I use TomTom for Sat Nav and my iPhone for traffic. The idea of paying for traffic updates just annoys me… Can’t really comment on other brands as I’ve had TomTom for years, on my third model now. I like the clean user interface.

Hospital, hands down. Your partner will be fine the days you’re at work and will greatly appreciate the time you have at home. You’ll have an interesting and challenging work life to keep you motivated when ‘home’ becomes stressful – remember it works that way round as well…

Career and motivating job vs bored out of your mind… Not much of a choice really. Home will be home, work you can change. Go for it 8)

Baring in mind the aesthetic impact on buying decisions I recon 650 will do just fine. 29″ look downright wrong much of the time and to my mind has had the knock on effect of making 26″ look small, 650b on the whole looks, well ‘right’ to me. We’ll argue pointlessly about which is best of course but if you want to buy a pretty bike then 650 looks a winner.

Such as…