Do discounted bikes get less good kit?

[Prawo Jazdy]

Earlier this year I bought my first road bike, a Ridgeback Road Platinum. I decided I didn't want to go crazy for my first foray into road cycling and all the likely scrapes that brings, so I stopped building £900 bikes on the Ribble website and looked at 2012 bikes. I found a 2012 Platinum for £499, which I thought was pretty reasonable. It has Tiagra bits apart from the brakes, which are some company i've never heard of.

I re-read the review of it today and noticed it keeps referring to 105 parts.

http://www.bikeradar.com/gear/category/bikes/touri...

I've no gripe here, as the bike came exactly as advertised, but I just wondered if "last year's" bikes sometimes get a lesser groupset put on when the price gets dropped?

[starnberg]

2011 bike with 105 components:

http://www.evanscycles.com/products/ridgeback/plat...

2012 bike with Tiagra:

http://www.evanscycles.com/products/ridgeback/plat...

Model change - seems to have disappeared from the range this year.

[Prawo Jazdy]

Duh, I didn't think to check the date of the review. That's that then, thank you!