I have been looking at Fishing rods and reels for the first time since the late 80's.  Back then everything was about gear ratio 6.3:1 being about the best.  I come back in 2002 and what do I find everything is now about Ball Bearings. My best casting real has 5 ball bearings. Now I look and I see that Company A's and Company B's best reels (those priced about 350.00) have 13 and 14 ball bearings. WHAT THE????  hahahahaha.  Before you know it they will have 700 ball bearings and I still couldn't tell the difference.  My best rig, ie the one I have cought the most fish on is a beaten all to hell, 25.00 Daiwa spinning reel, with a 6'6" rod that has been busted in two, once and epoxied back together in a marvelously ingenious way at the lake. The handle has hooks in it, and the foam of the handle has been throughly soaked with blood bate, stinkbate, minnow juice, worm juice, fish scales and everything else. The reel is completely dirty and greasy.  That is my lucky rod. I have cought hundreds of fish on it. So what do I need to go down and spend 450.00 on a rod and reel. Fact is I don't, and I won't.

 But upon taking up fishing anew I have run into a product that is Balls to the walls, totally kick ass, and that is SPIDER WIRE. That stuff is the bomb.  I am now able to put 30# test line on my rods and still get 120-150 yards on my reels and I can't even bite the line in two. The stuff is tough as nails. And won't break at all. Of course you have to use a regular mono-filament leader to your tackle so that if you get hung up you can break your line loose without having to cut your line near your pole.  I have been wanting to get a magnifing glass and look at how this stuff is contructed it appears from what I can see to be braided or woven. It is a composite material , spectra I believe. They say instant hook sets, well that is NO lie.  I highly recommend this stuff.

After trying all the new and approved lines, I still use Trilene Big Game 25#. I fish Lake Fork regularly and 25# Big Game is the way to go for me. After you set the hook hard in a fish or a stump the braided lines bury themselves into the remaining line on the reel, making your next cast a nightmare. However, it does have a place in some applications.

In my experience, manufacturers who don't make reel parts to exacting specs seem to try to use the most ball bearings on the medium priced reels to try and make up for these deficiencies.  In other words, you can get great reels that are as smooth as silk with much fewer ball bearings (read cheaper in price), because some of the better manufacturers make better fitting parts and lubricate them well, thus doing fine with just bushings in some areas.  Take all new reels out of the box and try them at the store, as you would be suprised at the smoothness of one over the other (even in the same model).

I do agree that even the average reel is much smoother than those of the 70's and 80's.

As far as line goes, if you're made of money, "superlines" that have small for their lb. test diameters and have little if any stretch are ok, especially on baitcast reels.

Just remember though, that these lines are very expensive and because they are smaller diameter, you need to put a lot more line on your reel that you will likely never use.  You can of course, leave some of the old line on the spool as a backer so you don't have to fill the spool with as much new line.

Monofilament with its stretch, still has a lot of uses and I actually prefer it for most fishing.  You just have to change it a little more often.