I have noticed something really troubling in my quad magazines.Why are ALL of the magazines so honda biased?

 

Where do you see that? I think a lot of people see a bias in teh magazines but it's not a Honda bias.

 

Back in the day Honda made a superior quad to everyone....not so anymore. Everyone has at least as much reliability anymore and actually more of everything. I see no Honda bias anymore with the mags.

 

Sorry, I just don't see a Honda bias, although this year a lot of people may be complaining of a Can Am bias. At least since '04 Hi-Torque has been lambasting Honda for its' sport quad offereings(or lack thereof) and even earlier for the esp problems.

 

To me the moto rag bias is not either for or against Honda. The real bias is against anything that is more utility oriented rather than sport oriented. When comparing the Ranchers to the Eiger or comparing the Foreman to the Vinny the rags will often place all the importance on speed and features rather than durability/utility. When an Arctic Cat or Polaris is in a shootout you can be assured they will both be hammered because the rags prefer the sporty models over utilitarian models. I have often thought the rag editors must have some serious inferiority complex because they want us to think they have the skills to need the fastest and best easy terrain handling set up. What is needed is testers from the real world of ATV buyers and not insecure wannabe racers.
The other situation is that many times the rags will go ape over something just because it is new and different. The King Quad was quad of the year in 05 in all the rags and then with the Bombs and new Rincon they dropped the King to near bottom and cooked up some major problem with steering that mysteriously was not seen in 05. IMO this is total BS. Now be assured they will all be going nutsaaa over the 700 Griz totally out of proportion to its real value just because it is newer.

 

The "bias" seems to be towards whatever is newest, and which company filled the rest of their pages with advertisments.

 

I agree with oldturtle

I get aggravated when I see twice as many sport ATV shootouts/info than utility... then the emphasis is placed on speed and handling vs features and just how utilitarian the machine is-- AC and Polaris get hammered for weight every article I read, but they seem to go awefully fast for being 100lbs heavier than everyone else.

Honda has fallen behind in the atv industry imo-- u don't see the 400ex winning as much anymore & they just don't change their ATVs often enough.