You should choose your quad based upon the factors (speed, looks, certain unique abilities, etc) that are most important to you and type of riding you will be doing. I've owned a SP700, P650 and a P700 and now a BF. I ride with a guy that has a Grizzly. I've enjoyed ALL of them(barring the initial troubles I had with my SP700).

I don't think you can go wrong with any of the big bores. The only one I wouldn't own is the Quest 650 because it's so utility oriented and the step through design. All the rest are awesome.

 

I highly i agree about the magzines being bias. I think Dirt Wheelers is pro yahama. The more money given the more face time.

 

Exactly, you can't go wrong with any of the big bores. They are all pretty fast, they are all going to follow each other through almost anything (which includes about any 4wd ever made as well), and they are all built fairly well. You really have to nitpick to start culling them out.

If you think about it, most of the things that we consider "BAD" or "Wrong" with all of these quads stem from those "Mine is better than yours" arguements, and if you look at them all from a distance, a lot of it is real nitpicky stuff. Like the arguements on the kawasaki lock lever vs. yamaha push button lock and stuff like that. The style of automatic shift lever and how hard the seat is, all kinds of little stuff. And in all reality, its not stuff that you really notice or have major problems with most of the time.

I think the best thing is just to decide what your preferences are and what you want most, and then go grab that. Regardless of what the others say. Use the information they give you to help you make your decision. Thats what I normally did.

When buying my Arctic Cat, I wanted something rugged at the time that was fast enough to keep up, but didn't have to be the fastest. I bought it over a Foreman, because I decided that it was built tough like the Foreman only had better brakes and a better ride.

When I bought my yamaha, I knew it wasn't as fast as the prairie and didn't handle as well as it did, but it had the differential lock, and I wanted the independant suspension to straddle rocks and logs and stuff. Plus, for me, I really liked the way it looked.

The shootouts always will give you some good information, but their decision of the last place quad might be the one you would like the best if you were buying. Always something to think about.

As far as the topic goes, most of the quads that will be in it have many of the same features. I say that they will give it to the King Quad or Sportsman EFI solely based on the fact that they are fuel injected, and I would imagine that will be enough for a magazine to consider them the winner.