So my Tacx Satori is 12 years old now and still going strong; gotta be some 20+ year old ones still going out there? They are pretty bombproof apart from a bit of paint flaking.
I guess many will have moved to smart trainers now though.
1 Like
Got a Tacx Flow about 14 years ago still going.
Added the PC upgade head unit a few years ago.
Doesn’t get used as much as it should nowadays but will rectify this 
Going off at a bit of a tangent but wheel on trainers seemed pretty robust and my Bkool is about 5 years old now. Lives in the shed year round in all temperatures and damp but just keeps going, albeit it was never the best when new but it still does what it does.
I seem to hear nothing but horror stories about direct drive trainers, except maybe the Neo which is top dollar. I really would consider buying one of the mid range models but they all seem to have issues.
Yes, not much to go wrong with a classic wheel-on trainer!
I have an 8yr old i-genius. There’s nothing very genius about it as without the TACX upgrade it won’t talk to Zwift or anything other than TTS. So my trainer is obsolete running on unsupported software on a laptop running windows 7. It drives me nuts as more often than not it won’t connect or drops connectivity during a session if I pause for any reason.
Yeah, I find a PM & ‘dumb’ trainer is the best option without splashing-out on a new smart trainer, which will get very little use in my case.
I upgraded to a Tacx Vortex about 4 yrs ago and it still does everything I need, see no reason to go out and drop a load of cash on a direct drive unit
Interesting.
My tacx flow (2012 - simple version) broke twice in 3 years. The 3rd time I put it in the bin and bought an elite direct drive.
1.5 weeks, still going strong
Computrainer - got about 12 years on it
That’s the approach I used for a long time. Direct drive does make the experience a lot more enjoyable, and the road feel of the dumb trainer was pretty poor, which is why I’d stopped using it regularly. I now do the bulk of my training on the smart trainer all year around.
Got it for a relative bargain off Sport Pursuit, with the active advantage discount code
I have a kickr, first generation I think. It has been absolutely bomb proof. When I bought my Garmin Vector pedals though I found out the kickr was making me think I was better than I really was. Not by much, but enough to make me sad.
2 Likes
I’ve been looking at Kickrs and the consensus seems to be the early ones were good, the early batches of the updated one (2018?) not so good and the Core is basically an early one so good too.
Yeah, I think historically smart trainers have been a tad flattering; people who had the Tacx Flow were really getting their egos massaged 
So much so, I would always ask if they were ‘Tacx Watts’.
My Bkool is the opposite, it reads quite low and I had a (slightly) pleasant surprise when I started using a power meter with it. Now if only both numbers weren’t still sh1t.
1 Like
Tacx Flux 2, less than a year old. My PM went as did my dumb trainer.
Gen 2 Kickr so 2016?, has been faultless. Power readings are near enough the same as my Assioma pedals. Find the smart trainer gets much more use than my old trainer ever did, almost exclusively used with Zwift
Ancient
More abuse than Saudi Arabia… does the job and reads watts…
Old school all the way…
Elite Direto just coming up to 2yrs old. Previous trainer was an Elite dumb one and well over 10yrs.
Chrono Elite, had for about 8 years i reckon? Gets used sporadically. Now left outside but under a cover so gets wet, but not drenched. A bit of surface rust, but still spins for 30 mins or so that i can withstand the boredom.