Originally Posted by
Roopull
If you're in a hilly area, the downtube shifters will be a pain.
I respectfully disagree with that pretty much 100%, but then I grew up with downtube shifters in a very hilly area and never had to give them a second thought. Still live there, and still have them on most of my bikes.
Originally Posted by
Roopull
With integrated brake/shifters, I shift pretty much shift whenever I feel like it.
Me too. With downtube shifters, stem shifters, gripshifts and bar ends. Still haven't owned a bike with brifters, but I probably will someday.
One nice thing that doesn't get mentioned often enough when dealing with those "pain in the @ss, non-indexed friction downtube shifters" is the infinite variability of the shifting mechanism. Sure, you sort of have to "adjust" them each and every shift. But on the other hand, you get infinite adjustability on every shift. That's a system that works 100% of the time; not just when everything is perfectly dialed in. If you are riding 20 miles a day, the learning curve is pretty short.