My commuter Felt SR91 came stock with 52-42-30 crankset and an 8-speed 12-25 cassette, but the lowest gear (30/25) is not low enough. The ride to work is about half flat, but the other half is a long steep climb, and I end up walking most of that section on the way home.

I'm pretty new to the concept of adjusting gearing, so this is a pretty basic question, I think. I plan to change out the cassette for lower gearing but I'm not sure if I should go for an 11-32 or an 11-34. Is there a big difference between a 30/32 pairing versus a 30/34 pairing?

A gear inch calculator tells me this:

30/25 = 32.0 gear inches
30/32 = 25.1 gear inches
30/34 = 23.5 gear inches

... but practically, I don't know if the difference between 25.1 gear inches and 23.5 gear inches will be significant to my legs, since I've never experimented with this before.

It looks like there might be some tradeoff in shifting smoothness if I go for the 34-tooth, so I am leaning toward the 32-tooth.

Thoughts?

Thanks so much...