Went to Mazda dealership today to drive The RX. They had 4 on the lot and another 40!! on the way. I showed up in the S and the salesman was quite interested in my car. Anyways he let me take one for a spin. I must say the interior was well thought out. The interior pieces seem to be of pretty good quality, the rear seat is useless though. One thing I didn't like was the plastic or vinyl??? on the side bolsters on the seats, the rest was leather but it just didn't look or feel right with the plastic on the seat. The cabin is pretty quiet cruising around and the ride was fairly stiff. The salesman was cool, he let me run it pretty hard. It is no where close to the S in speed but it likes to pull all the way to redline. The engine is very smooth and sounds good, but I keep waiting for that VTEC rush and it never came. I did like the 6-spd, its throws were short and precise-I think I like it better than the S's. They were asking sticker, which was $31995 and this was everything except nav. Would I trade the S for it?? Hell No! I took him for a spin in my car afterwards and he was very impressed with the performance. He said he didn't realize the power the S had. One thing that I did like about the red RX they had was the black and red leather steering wheel. I may be dropping Rick a few hundred bucks in the near future for a new steering wheel.

 

Yah I went to two Mazda dealers today. One on them didn't have any and the onther one had two. None of the sales people even said hi to me so I just left. I agree with you about the back seat though, not to much leg room.

 

I checked out yesterday, its aight (blue,graphite) going for a test drive sometime this week.

 

Wow, that is saying alot!

 

you won't be dissapointed that much if you don't bring the S along with you mentally on a test drive The 8's a different car and one should go into driving it with a fresh mind.

 

True!

 

It's a great looking car. Looks better than the S2000 when comparing stock/stock cars. When modded, it's neckneck.

As for the interior, head and shoulders above the 350Z and a shoulder above the S2000's. But what gets me to love the S2000's stuff is the F1 style gauges, etc so i'd lean towards the S here still just from being a big F1 fan.

Shifter feel is excellent. Definitely a diff feel than the S2000's so can't say which one is better. The RX-8's feels like a BMW manual but with shorter throws so it's very smooth whereas the S2000 feels like it's linked to a piece of steel/mechanical thing with even shorter throws albeit slightly.

 

I saw one at the auto show and I have to say the interior looked cheezy. The glossy, circular radio was too much IMO. And yeah i noticed the same thing about the ribbed plastic back seats, or whatever that was. didn't look too hot. There was a suprising amount of rear seat space though, especially for a sports car. It's a hot car all around, but Mazda needs to make a twin-turbo version!