Currently I've been riding a Lib Tech Skate Banana 151cm. I'm 5'7", when I bough my board I was 160lbs but now over 190lbs. I came to full realization that as much as I would like to be a park rider, I'm more suited to free riding. So I started looking at new longer boards and narrowed it down to another lib tech 154-156. Trouble is there is so many different camber choices to look at. My reverse camber seems great, but I see there are also hybrids of that concept. And there is also standard camber. My biggest question is how do each of these affect your control and feel when powered by a kite. Would one be better than the rest to hold solid lines yet still work excellent in powder, hard packed, and ice? Hopefully after Christmas I can find a great Boxing Day deal.

Reverse camber with no sidecut is about the perfect snowkite board in my opinion.... I am on the lookout for a 155 banana hammock....

And minimal camber Flat with little sidecut would be your best bet on firm/ice. But for Ice I'd get a beater board and slap a switchblade on it. Turns a board into a boiler plate riding weapon.

http://mnkiteboy.com/Switchblade.html

They aren't cheap (around $200 I think) but worth every penny IMO. Can easily double the number of days you get if the surfaces stay firm.

Side cut won't matter with the Switchblade.

I was thinking of swithchblade this fall, but then it snowed enough for full ice coverage. I thought of the banana hammock, but in the end I want to have a board that I can and will use for everything. Everything seems to have around the same or more for sidecut these days. Little camber would be great to hold a solid line, but thinking that it might not be the same in powder. So many choices wish I could have one for every situation. Right now I am thinking another skatebanana but longer or possible the banana magic.

Has anyone tried the Aboards Reverse?? Looks similar to the libtech skate banana. But it says that it is flat in the middle and rocker after the feet. Wonder how it would be on the hill or back country kiting.

Total noob to kiting here, and I don't snowboard either. But I think ski characteristics have to be similar? Standard camber is good for quick transitions, (turning one direction to the other) making things lively and playful. "Energy."

This can be coupled with tip rocker only, sometimes called early tip rise. You def want that for powder, or anything other than hardpack / boilerplate. The only disadvantage to this is on the hard stuff it makes it behave as though it were shorter, so you need to go longer. Which you're looking to do anyway, right?

So I'd think your ideal set-up would be very energetic, with tip rocker. (How much and where that starts is a fine point)

What about a blend of Camber and Rocker? I'm looking at the Travis Rice Pro or a Never Summer for all mountain riding and also kiting. Seems to me that the mix of the two focuses on the best of both worlds. Rocker for float in Powder, camber for the hardpack. I road a pure rocker/reverse camber today and thought it was the most unstable thing ever. Maybe just a personal preference but I definitely could not ride that thing hard.

p8ntballsk8r, I love my Never Summer for all mountain riding. Haven't taken it out kiteboarding yet, not enough snow for my good board.
Which rocker/camber board did you find unstable by the way, I ride the NS Heritage which is a rocker/camber and it rides like it was on rails on any surface except ice crust (and what board rides well on ice crust, really). However, it is a stiff board which requires a lot of loading to flex and if you don't ride aggressively it can chatter over crud instead of carving.

I just got a heritage as well. It's amazing

I ended up getting a new set of GNU Agro bindings instead this time around. Couldn't decide and figured if I'm spending another 500-700 on a board, I'll push one more season on the one I have. I did e-mail mervin manufacturing (gnu/libtech company) in my search, and asked if they ever thought to explore snowkite boards. They got back asking what I had in mind. I passed on the ideas off this thread and off various other threads on the net. Also mentioned trying to get opinions from kite manufactures. They sent it to their R&D team and said they are always open to exploring new avenues. Maybe something will come out of it maybe not.