29er recommendations

[Becky]

I demo'ed that same bike and ended up with an alloy Niner Jet 9. I've ridden it all season, including some fairly technical places, and been really happy with it. If I sold it today, I'd probably replace it with the new version they just released....air-formed and with 100 mm of travel, rather than 80 mm like mine.

Edit: I chose to buy a frame during their sale last December and pick my own parts rather than purchase something pre-built. I ended up with full XT, a SID XX fork (closeout cuz it's QR, not thru-axle), and I built up a set of wheels with some XTR hubs I had and a set of Stan's Crest rims. Pricewise, it was comparable to their 3-star build: http://www.ninerbikes.com/jet9. It was worth a little bit of extra work on my part to get exactly what I wanted and grab some stuff on closeout as well.

[TrekDianna]

This is a good time to be shopping so check around. The shops around here are closing out whatever they have left and the two FS we bought in the last week we got at 60-75% off.