Seems like a lack of really great 2004 innovation. 2003 saw lots of great new suspesion designs and fun component innovations that we seem to be lacking this year.
Stuff like the EPIC and 2003 XTR was made me all sweaty just thinking about it. This year we have only tweaks on the original and trickle down to get revved about.

I'm not disgruntled, just bored.

Seems to me like everybody's jumping on the SPV bandwagon instead of developing alternatives.

Yup.
Maybe when things are as good as they are (debateable) innovation slows down. How long had it been BEFORE 2003 since we had seen any real advancements in mountain biking?

1. Knobby Tires
2. Front Suspension
3. Dr. Horst and his special link
4. Hydraulics
5. ....

Pretty good for such a relatively short life. But where's the fun for 2004???!

that was the general feel i got at interbike this year. nothing exciting. just minor tweaks to old designs.

Sometimes the biggest payoff comes in the refinement of an idea, not necessarily new ideas. Take car suspension, for example. There are all types of refinements out there, but nothing really new. Most high performance suspension designs that I'm familiar with use some form of a 4-bar design.

There really wasn't anything new last year either in bike suspension. You have the VPP, but that's not new. It's around 10 years old. The only real newness in bike suspension are the stable platform shocks.

Sometimes you don't need to look ahead for innovation... instead at re-inventing the past.

#5 (more like #1 best mtb innovation) according to Richard Cunningham, who through his shameless promotion, would be Stan's Tubeless...

I think I counted 6 references (read: free advertising) to Stan's in the last MB Action. Which is kinda sad on my part that I have nothing better to do...

Don't get me wrong, I think it's a good product, but come on!

I guess 2002-03 was a year of new innovations etc and now we will just see lots jumping on the stable platform bandwagon and companies revising their suspension line ups.

I think we'll see lots of 5" bikes coming out like the spot etc as that seems to be the popular thing...

test test test

Seems like a lack of really great 2004 innovation. 2003 saw lots of great new suspesion designs and fun component innovations that we seem to be lacking this year.
Stuff like the EPIC and 2003 XTR was made me all sweaty just thinking about it. This year we have only tweaks on the original and trickle down to get revved about.

I'm not disgruntled, just bored....significant and broad scoped is on the horizon. Also, just because you don't see many new frame designs out there, doesn't mean there aren't, it depends on what niche of the sport you're into. Some fairly new designs I've seen that I like are the Specialized Demo 9, Astrix Huckster, Devinci Guzzler, Ventana El Chamuco and X5, and Litespeed's Niota. In componentry there's the SRAM triggers, Race Face's 2 piece cranks, Time's XS pedals, Magura Louise FR brakes, and Maverick's new inverted SC fork. By "broad scoped", I mean things that many can make use of, rather than a few exotic designs (excluding the Maverick), that only a small segment of the mt biking community would buy. This stimulates growth within the industry, and makes way for bigger, better designs in the future on the "horizon". Without feeding the machine, we as consumers will not see revelations like internally geared frames, and adjustable travel FR forks, preferably a Talas 150 with quick adjust to 110.http://gallery.consumerreview.com/webcrossing/images/pbpic138946.jpg