In my opinion, I believe the tapered roller bearings are essentially a dumbed down version. They are very simple to adjust and even when not adjusted properly (within reason) they still seem to work without destroying the bearing and races.
My experience with ball bearings is that they have a specific torque value rather than 'spin the wheel and tighten' with typical tapered roller bearings. Ball bearings not adjusted properly seem a bit more capable of self destructing and fairly quickly at that.
Jeff
