When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?
When I first read that the series was to be set 80 to 90 years in the future from the TOS, I had certain expectations.
I kind of had in my mind a ship roughly the size of the Enterprise-A, but perhaps a bit more streamlined and certainly with smaller but more powerful engines (due to advancements in technology).
I was expecting some marvelous leaps in technology, such as being able to transport from much farther distances, perhaps even from system to nearby system (ie Gary Seven).
I was also expecting a starship that would be capable of intergalactic travel, even if only to nearby galaxies.
Instead we seemed to get a much larger ship with only apparently very modest improvements from the technology of the Kirk era.
It was like the powers-that-be decided to be adventurous by moving it decades into the future, but lacked the imagination or were just too plain lazy to deviate very much from what had come before.
I was left with the feeling of being cheated of all the events between Kirk's era and Picard's era.
if you were not going to advance the technology very much, then why bother with the roughly 100 year leap away from the era of Kirk if you were not going to show anything really new?