The three main sources of racquet reviews online (excluding this site) are Tennis Magazine, Tennis Warehouse, and Racquet Research. Each offers valuable information, but in shopping for a racquet, you should recognize the limitations in their reviews and ratings, especially those at Racquet Research, which make some strong generalizations about racquet design that may not be valid.
The reviews at Tennis Magazine usually provide basic data such as weight, balance, string pattern, composition, and swingweight, along with subjective ratings from a panel of play-testers. Their annual "Gear Guide," which comes out in April both in print and online, has a slightly different format each year, but it usually makes recommendations for different levels of play (such as NTRP 3.0 to 4.5) and styles (such as aggressive baseliner with long strokes). It also points out trends in the racquet industry, such as a new emphasis on stability or specialization. The reviews are not just marketing hype: they often make it pretty clear that a racquet should appeal to only a tiny percentage of potential buyers. "Gear Guide" reviews are quite brief and thus vague, though, and how the recommendations correlate to the technical specs is occasionally puzzling.
Tennis Warehouse is a retailer, and a shopper would naturally wonder how willing they would be to post a negative review. Their reviews are written by a panel of play-testers whose opinions tend to vary significantly on at least several criteria. One reviewer might say he likes the spin potential, another might say he was disappointed. This reflects how the playing public tends to react to a racquet. For most racquets though, there are certain points on which the reviewers strongly agree, and this is probably as good an indication as you'll get that you will agree, too. The reviews are long and highly detailed, and they include the usual technical data and a nice bar-graph summary of the racquet's ratings for the various playing criteria such as stability and control. The site's message boards are a rich source of comments from everyday players, although like any message board comments, these have no guarantee of objectivity or expertise.
Racquet Research tries to apply physics in a completely objective analysis of racquet specs and arrive at rankings for such crucial matters as elbow safety and shoulder safety. In general, heavy, head-light racquets fare best in the rankings, and light, head-heavy racquets worst. In the site's "Introduction to Racquet Science," the author, Wilmot McCutchen, lays out his criteria and offers links to derivations of each of his formulas, but several crucial assumptions and seeming contradictions are not clearly explained. The site offers valuable information and raises important questions, but the basis for some of his most essential conclusions is questionable.
