I've never skied straight skis. I never really see them on the hill, except for the one time I went to a tiny little bump in Indiana (Pines Peak) and around 80 percent of the skiers were on straight skis. Very strange.
As for rear entry boots, I skied in rear entry rental boots once, and I never will again. It didn't help that they were way too big. It was my second time skiing.
My first time, the hill I'd went to (Cascade, WI) had pretty nice rentals (at least comparatively!), I imagine my boots probably weren't the right size the first time, but it can't've been that bad, and the equipment was current, the boots were less than a year old.
The second time was at a much smaller place (Alpine Valley, WI). I'd already been fit for boots, but I didn't have my skis yet, and they didn't rent just skis out so I had to get rental boots as well. I told her my mondo size (25.5) and she told me that wasn't right, because of the shoe size I wear (10, sometimes 11). I kept telling her that I know what size I want, and she insisted that my idea of my boot size was based on a brand that sized things differently, and that I needed a 27.5. This went on for some time, and eventually I insisted that despite the fact that I could be wrong about this, I only wanted to rent boots in the size I asked for. She said she wasn't allowed to, as a professional she couldn't let someone who doesn't know better take inappropriate equipment and be liable when I hurt myself skiing the wrong size boots. I asked to speak with the manager, who more or less repeated what she said, and said that the most they could do was go down to a 27.
So off I went in huge, old, rear entry boots. Not much fun at all. I'm glad that wasn't my first day, it would've been hard to get hooked
