Like with bicycles, upgrading from ball-bearing to roller-bearing headset makes a huge different in smoothness and longevity. Contact area is TINY with ball-bearings and puts intense pressure on the balls and races. Roller-bearing has much larger contact area and spreads out weight & bump-loads over wider area for significantly better durability. For heavy-duty downhill MTB racing, it's easily a 10:1 ratio as far as how much better roller-bearings last compared to ball-bearings.
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