ShaneFartick

I live in Florida so I don’t think 12 gears matter! I road the Roubaix expert in Utah last summer and loved it! Both systems are great and at this point I will probably get whichever comes first. But the idea of wireless intrigues me so if some how they show up together I will get the SRAM. This was ordered in January and as of today it is still not on the 45 day list so Who knows when it is going to arrive!

ThinLine

I have ridden Di2 and etap, just bought a canyon ult slx 8.0 w/ etap (Force). I prefer etap, it just feels better, less arteries and dangles and just a slight depress does wonders.

Kimmo

You're eating, or maybe you're carrying a litre of milk home. How do you shift your Etap bike with one hand?

GlennR

Add a set of Blips on opposite sides.

JohnJ80

there’s a hack where you install blips (buttons places somewhere else other than brifters)near the shifters. Since the blips operate as the paddle for the shifter they’re attached to, if you put the left blip by the right shifter (and vice versa) in a strategic position, you can easily shift anything with one hand on either side. Big accessibility issue for some.

ericcox

Whike I personally vote that OP should take whichever arrives first, I don't believe Rival has any blip access ports.

GlennR

I agree to take what you can get.

You are correct as usual King Friday.

https://www.bicycling.com/bikes-gear...ap-axs-review/
"Rival’s hood shape is different from Force/Red AXS. Rival’s is smaller in diameter and with a more angular peak. SRAM’s engineers achieved this by removing the brake-pad contact point adjustment found in the higher-tier groups and removing the Blip/MultiClic remote ports. While I love remote shifters on my bar tops, Fowler says that only five to 10 percent of eTap users add remotes to their drop bar shifters."

Kimmo

If you're keen, you could just hack your own blips in, I suppose

ls01

I have 11 speed E tap and 12 speed Force axs. I've been on Sram since 2013.
I built both bikes last year. The etap 11 speed is great. Light works flawlessly. It's cable rim brake set up on a 2011 S-works Tarmac. It weighs 15 lbs. And I love it.
The Force axs, while it functions fine it is heavy. My 2016 S-works Tarmac comes in just over 18 lbs. It is a hydro disk brake bike, on post mounts. I can't imagine how much more weight there will be with Rival. I compromised and went with Force because Red would have cost another $1800.00.
My bigest problem with Sram is all the things they did to direct sales towards axs groupset and the proprietary parts they developed with the axs groupset.
I purchased the 11 speed e tap groupset brand new last year. Its only been available for 3 years. Sram announced last year, 3 months after my purchase, that it is no longer supported. So if something dies I have to find it used. Or swap everything out for something else.
As far as axs goes. Nothing previous is compatible. Not even the bottom bracket. Different size chain rollers, different size bearings in the Dub b.b. ,all to leverage more cash out of your pocket.
Swapping the Bottom bracket would have been ok if it would have addressed the problems with bb30 type b.b. but they stuck with that crap design.
I could go on all day about it but in the end I feel like Sram took things a little to far with axs and it's proprietary parts.
I liked sram when you could mix n match parts across the whole range. The whole build leaves me feeling like I got Ruphied on a date that I would have been a willing participant in. Except now I have no memory of participation and I need a long, long shower.
My next bike will likely be Shimano. Or maybe one of the new Chinese market groupsets. I can all but guarantee it won't be Sram.

tempocyclist

I've had 11-speed eTap and both 10 and 11-speed Di2. I much prefer Di2. One big plus is a single battery that last ages.

This is absolutely PERSONAL PREFERENCE though as they both shift great, but with different shaped hoods, shift patterns and whatnot you may want to test them out first. At the end of the day, you'd be more than happy with either.



Full Disclosure: While it was awesome when it worked, I was one of those cursed with eTap rear derailleur failures. Three in fact...

Kimmo

When I did the Di2 conversion to my old TCR, and gutted the A-junction and cut up some e-tube wires to make a custom loom, I found stuff like a square o ring on the charging port jack, and those e-tube wires are the toughest wires I've ever stripped that weren't three times the size. It's impressively engineered gear.

phrantic09

Does the Rival bike include the PM? If so, that makes the $200 difference seem a little more okay

DaveSSS 

The rival power meter is not standard. It's a $219 extra.

https://www.sram.com/en/sram/road/se...levancy&page=1