Mine was stolen in mid-January (tied up outside a bookstore in Milan)
Coming to your questions, I would like to ask you: what use do you have for it? commuting between home and work and various things? or also for sports use?
also: why "mountain"?... will you actually use it on unpaved surfaces?
If you only use it in the city (asphalt & cobblestones) I wouldn't get an off-road bike.
i have an aluminum Scuot frame that I don't complain about
It was new in November 2004. In January of this year, the down tube snapped in two. But after 12 years, with 5000 km per year always under stress on asphalt and cobblestones in Milan, one can speak not of a bad frame but of wear and tear.
(the painful note, for me, is that in January I bought a used bike that lasted me less than two weeks before the theft. So I had the old frame repaired by someone who welds aluminum)
Ah!... aluminum frame but,,, steel fork (or carbon, if you want to spend more)
mine was also proletarily expropriated a few days ago (I am still in "blasfemo very strong" mode) it was a specialized rockhopper front mountain bike, 26", ....what a shame! (....damn them!....)
i am not an enthusiast or a "fanatic" (in a positive sense; pure envy, I know!).
i used it indiscriminately both to go to work and for some off-road rides, even technical ones,
with friends. it was a slightly older model, damage relatively limited. i, without a bike, can't cope, these days I am in desperate search of a good model:
