It may have been said above, and also may not be as easy now as when I bought my two bikes, one back in 2011, and the other in 2015, but I took the time to seek out the bikes I had short listed and test ride them.
As a newbie back then in 2011 I test rode a Panasonic crank drive Kalkhoff that I expected to be a formality before buying it, but was a bit underwhelmed and then tried their sport version that I liked but was too pricey for me. The shop were also selling Oxygen Emate citie bikes, a rear hub Chinese generic electric component bike, and I loved it immediately, and bought that for £1399. I still have it, and still use it a lot, though have had to replace some parts, but that has been relatively easy using generic parts cheaply available off ebay.
So I bought a completely different bike to the one I thought I would after test rides, and for me, the test rides were very important and I still love and use that bike a lot.
All bikes have their own feel, and every person responds differently according to what they prefer. The difficulty as a newbie is that you don't know what you prefer yet!
I did the same when I bought my Haibike hard tail Yamaha, test riding several bikes and systems before buying my Haibike, and again doing that has been very worthwhile as the characteristics of the Yamaha crank drive system are exactly to my preference, after comparing it with the market leading Bosch system of that time, as well as other systems.
Also as a newbie I might consider giving the Whoosh Gran-Camino due consideration as a tough well thought out bike from a well regarded supplier with keen pricing.
Though I am sure a Wisper Wayfarer H9 is great, it is quite a lot more money than the Woosh that could enable you to buy a second large spar battery for the Woosh and it still be cheaper.
For maximum range my crank drive Haibike Yamaha is more efficient and flexible than my old cadence controlled rear hub bikes, as it uses a torque system making you contribute a portion of effort to receive a portion of power from the motor. More by luck than judgement the Yamaha motor has proven to be very tough and adds no drag when you select no motor assistance. If you de restrict it and choose a low assist mode, there is no hitting the wall feeling, and the cruising speed is higher than the legal cut out point but not a silly high speed, and naturally restricted by gradients, wind etc, so in the 19 to 22 mph range with a realistic chance of the best of both worlds with a high average speed approaching 20mph and a long range by saving battery capacity where you can without losing speed. Once you gained experience of riding in this way I would expect the Haibike to be able to achieve 50 miles by selecting low or no assistance where gradients allowed. I have certainly found this.
Completely unscientific but I have just come back from a 26 mile ride, mostly off road with 236 metres of vertical difference between my starting point and destination but with plenty of ups and downs in between, and used 37% of my 400Wh original battery now in its eighth year, and only 31% to the base of the last hill to climb home where I upped the assist and used 6% in the last half a mile home. So the way I used the assistance on this ride would equate to a total range of just over 70 miles.
www.pedelecs.co.uk
