Originally Posted by
Tourist in MSN
A friend of mine has Travel Agents on his V brakes on his foldup bike so he can use brifters. I have a Travel Agent on the V brake on the front on my expedition bike, the rear on that bike is cantilever so Travel Agent not needed on the back. The Travel Agents do just fine at converting the V brakes (long cable pull) to conventional (short cable pull) brake levers.
Personal preference comes into play here... I'm fine with full V brakes but mini-v is pushing it with clearance. I don't have a problem with canti brakes (although many people do); still, I would never convert a bike to canti from v-brake while buying extra hardware (anchor points for the cables). Travel Agents are ugly imho. For me, and I can only speak for myself, the big advantage of discbrakes is that some of them are specifically designed to work with integrated shifters... that's a huge plus in my book.
Disc brakes are also better if you have to ride an out of true wheel to the next town with a bike shop, as they won't rub (although disc rotors can go out of true for other reasons).
I wouldn't avoid a used touring bike because it lacks disc brakes, but confronted with buying new, I'd personally but the bike that has them.