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chrismanc-
What are the seals like on the XT hubs? LBS didn't seem to think much of them
That's because they want to sell you £100 Hope hubs rather than £30 Shimano ones. The labyrinth seals on XT hub main bearings are probably better than the cartridge bearing seals on Hope or any other hub which uses standard industrial cartridge bearings. The weak spot on Shimano hubs from a sealing point of view tends to be the freewheel bearings, but they have to be rode hard and put up wet to be a real problem, and it's cheap to buy a new hub and do a guts transplant when they do fail.
gbj_tester
There's nowt wrong with XT hubs, M756 is still available if you want to stick with 6-bolt