I'm joining this discussion rather late, as I haven't had time to keep up with the discussions on the forums.
I purchased an e-bike last year, and have had a number of positive and negative experiences:
1) It is heavy, if you run out of juice, it is a serious amount of work trying to peddle yourself and all the extra dead weight. One of my very early rides was from Mascot to Chatswood (sydney) and return (with no stop to recharge). I only made it back to Nth Sydney before the battery totally died. It was real hell getting the rest of they way home
2) It doesn't go fast! I'm not saying the electric needs more power, what I'm saying is that I can't pedal fast enough to get or maintain a decent speed. Reasons for this are the smaller wheel diameter and the gearing. This just comes down to bike design.
3) Battery life - just not long enough, I want to ride further and further without the constant worry of the battery giving out. Also, the battery "meter" basically only tells me one of three states:
a) You have some power
b) You have a tiny amount of power
c) You have practically no power
I want to know exactly how much I have, so I can turn around and head home at 50% remaining, or to know if I need to stop and recharge now or not/etc...
4) Spokes - totally crap, it used non-standard spokes, which were crap quality. I broke a number of spokes on the rear wheel before my LBS replaced them all in one go, with better quality spokes, and in a different lacing<?> style. I've recently discovered a couple of broken spokes on the *front* wheel, which AFAICT, is somewhat unheard of.
5) Power - lack of it when going up hills. Mine tends to cut out the power shortly after starting up the hill because I assume it is attempting to draw too much power from the battery. The only way to solve this is stop mid-hill, use the key to switch off/on, and continue for another few seconds until the problem repeats, or just ride up the hill without power. That kind of defeats the whole point of power assisted IMHO. Mind you, this is only on the steeper hills, a small incline is no problem (but then again, power assist isn't really needed there anyway).
6) On a good note, I love my bike, I was able to ride in 35+ degree heat, and arrive at my destination without being totally dripping. In fact, I could do it and look almost like I arrived in a car with a bit of a walk at the end. However, I tend to try to pedal quickly, and so usually end up a pretty hot anyway
That's all for now, most of the above issues are related to the specific bike I purchased, and the trade-offs associated with it's design. I'm not sure whether I intend to purchase a normal bicycle, or another e-bike, because my current one is more often than not out of service due to the broken spokes.
Looking forward to them getting a bit cheaper (I spent over $2000 on mine) and also to iron out some of the wrinkles. I'll probably have another go at a power assisted bike at some point when other areas of my life settle down and I get some more riding time... especially summer ")