HALCYON TALOS or Kona CALDERA 2009 or Scott Aspect 35

soromak

Hello,
I want purchase a bike in a budget of £350-450 shortly.
After reading a lot of posts in this forum I came to conclusion that Voodoo Bantu would be the best to go for.
However I also found HALCYON TALOS that looked quite interesting for £449 available from rutlandscycling http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/HALCYON-TALOS ... 406wt_1195.
Since there is a lack of posts about this bike and this is maximum I can spend on a bike, is it worth £100 than the Voodoo?
Cheers.

supersonic

Yes, very good spec for the money.

soromak

@supersonic -any thanks for your advice. However if I add a setup fee of the Halcyon by my LBS then this bike will be only slightly cheaper that Rockrider 8.1. Is there a significant difference between these two (could anyone list it spec by spec for me, please)?

chez_m356

i'd say there pretty comparable really, the RR8.1 has better brakes and chainset, other than that, there's not much in it, and its something a little different from the norm, as sonic said, a very good spec for the money

benpinnick

I doubt you'd need to pay your lbs for a sett up. Rutland are a well respected shop (shop of the year in the industry awards 2011 IIRC) so I would hope it would be pretty good to go out of the box.

soromak

I found this info at Rutlands website in a description of this bike (but not at ebay):" PLEASE NOTE: This bike comes in its factory box and will require some assembly, professional set up advised." so I guess a setup in a local LBS might be needed.

cooldad

Normally that just means putting the wheels and pedals on, and straightening the bars - all things that are easy and you'll probably need to do sooner or later anyway. Check out the Parktools website for how to do anything.

soromak

Thanks for the advices. Getting my card ready to putchase Talos I found Kona Calders 2009 at Paul's for £479 at my size http://www.paulscycles.co.uk/products.php?show=1938. Now I am really torn between these 2 :? Thanks for last minute suggestions

soromak

Hi,
After unexpected car repairs I finally managed to get enough funds (£500) to go ahead with a purchase and start enjoying the weather.
In the meantime I found one more interesting bike - besides these mentioned in the thread this Scott appears to be nice:
http://www.paulscycles.co.uk/products.p ... 1b0s2p3025

so in the end my list consists of:

Halcyon Talos, Kona Caldera 2009 (links provided earlier), Scott and off course well regarded Rockrider 8.1.
Which of these 4 provides best value for money?

Thanks.

passout

I agree with the advice above but personally I've always liked Kona. A mate has the Caldera & rates it. I keep hearing good things about the Rockrider. They all seem good value to me but you also need to consider sizing / fit & which one suits you. Can you see any of these in the flesh?

soromak

passout wrote:

I agree with the advice above but personally I've always liked Kona. A mate has the Caldera & rates it. I keep hearing good things about the Rockrider. They all seem good value to me but you also need to consider sizing / fit & which one suits you. Can you see any of these in the flesh?

Nope, that's the problem. I can only try out Halfords and my LBS stores only Giants.

passout

Well that might be enough to sway me towards either of those two establishments. There is something to be said for supporting your LBS.

soromak

I am maybe missing something, but haven't seen any Giant near these specs at this price range...