I'm short too...5'2" with a 28.5-29.0 inseam (they didn't call me stumpy in HS for nothing).

I have a Specialized road bike that doesn't fit me, I won't buy Specialized again...like Running Mommy it's just a personal preference. I don't like them for smaller folks, I just don't think they fit well but that's just me. I'm sure there are pleanty of shorter folks out there that it works for them.

For mountain bikes I used to have a Fisher Cake 3 XS women's that I loved and now I have a Santa Cruz Juliana in XS...both 13" and they fit me like a glove.

A couple weekends ago before I got my Santa Cruz I had rented a mountain bike to use which was fine. What wasn't fine was the fact that the rear derail. snapped off while I was peddling without me doing anything. It was a Shimano Alivio.

I'm a big advocate of: "You get what you pay for". I would pay the money to upgrade to at least Deore.