SideShowB0b

Ive always sort of conformed to the ideas that unless a car is trying to kill you, its lacking in driver involvement.

RWD, no traction control, lairy, and a backend thats begging to catch you out, are all things ive assumed are par for the course for a "proper" car, so when I decided to go and drive an Audi A3 3.2 DSG just for the fun of it, I was expecting to walk away smiling smugly at just how boring and uninvolving it was, and race off in my S feeling happy that my car was so much more fun to drive than the boring Kraut mobile.

Rocked up at Audi, and they had a 3 door demonstrator in, and were happy to take myself and the girlfriend out for a spin in it.

Looks wise, it had a slight body kit, and looked very nice. Even opening and closing the doors showed just how well built it was, and the interior is superb, very high quality.
Salesman drove first, and has apparently one a few trackdays in one of these, so decided to show us just how capable the modern Quattro system is.
Its hugely impressive!! the car never felt out of control, and during the drive it started to tip down with rain, and it didnt slow progress at all.

When it came to my turn, I was already very impressed, so jumped in, stuck it into Sport mode, and took it for a good hard drive.
What blew me away was the A to B abilities of the car. Any surface, any weather, all I did was keep the accelerator pushed in, and no matter what you threw at it, it swept straight round the corners.

In the S, id have braked, changed down, worried whether the surface may upset the back end, and then accelerated through and out, whereas the A3, you just keep going exact same speed you were before the corner, and keep powering all the way through.

The engine (3.2) is lovely, you can thrash it in Sport mode, and be doing 120 in no time at all, and it has a really nice growl to it.
Used the steering mounted paddles, and they're good fun, the DSG is superb in every way, changes are very quick, though it does take some getting used to.

The most surprising thing was the smile I had on my face the whole drive!! really enjoyed it, and it was actually nice to get in a car and drive it hard without making a song and dance about it.
Performance wise, 0-60, 0-100, the S probably feels quicker due to all the noise, but im not sure there'd be much in it, and on a typical rubbish surface, puddly B road with lots of corners, im almost certain the A3 would have it, simply because you can concentrate on placing the car in the best position, and keep the power in.

My opinion of these sorts of cars has certainly changed. The quality alone was impressive, and to have a car that is so adaptable and capable is a revelation. I wont say im entirely converted, as I still enjoy the S a lot, so it wont be for sale just yet, but I recon that, driver enjoyment, and driver involvement, are not directly proportional, and you can have serious fun in a car that encompases a lot of electronic wizadry.

It may well be an Audi is on the cards as my next car thou, there is so much to like about the car, and so little to critisise, and it seems im being inadvertantly drawn to them, as yesterday went out on an Audi TT 3.2 DSG test drive with my Civic Type-R driving mate, who was as impressed as I was with the A3.

So, do I need saving? is there any hope for me? or does anyone else respect just how much fun these cars are?

echo66

Yep fun they can be...........when i was thinking of the S i test drove an A3 as well as a Boxter (!!!...sorry) , a Z4 & a TT. They were good, all of them, but lacked that little something. The S has everything for me. They aren't a common car around this neck of the woods. I see more DB9's & 7's than i do S's. Likewise TT's, porkers, Z4's & Audi A whatevers.

If i see a really nice A3 or A4 with a sports kit on it i think, 'yeah nice looking motor but theres another just down the road'. I get in the S & it gives me all i want from a car & then some. Depends on the person buying/driving though doesn't it?

Ed

MarkB

I think you need to define 'fun'.

As I'm a company car driver, when I'm due for a change, the car companies allow me a few days (usually a weekend) with their cars to test them. It means I can use them day to day and have a good blast with them too.

When I got my first S2000, some years ago, my car at the time was an Audi A31.8T Quattro, which was well built, covered ground quickly and with minimal fuss and was as practical as I was ever going to need.

So, I ordered an S2000, a TT and the newly released X-Type for a test drive.

I found the TT a step up in performance from the A3, but the driving experience was just as numb, there was no feedback at all form the suspension or steering. It covered ground immensely well, but I was not involved, I was along for the ride. My initial amazement at the car's strengths was soon overshadowed by the realisation that there wasn't much for me to 'do'.

The X-Type was actually the more involving AWD car, one of the days I had it we had torrential rain, and I spent hours driving all my favourite A and B roads marvelling at the way the rear-biassed 4wd gave traction and made the car feel like a RWD car in the dry. It had a nice communicative chassis too, you could feel what the car was doing under you and felt involved in the driving process.

The S2000 of course was the one I went for, a weekend in both the wet and dry with one showed me the car's strengths and weaknesses, but it also showed me that there was a car on the company list which suited me extremely well, gave me driving satisfaction and allowed me to control the situation, a car I could learn to drive and have fun in at the same time.

In all, I did 700 miles in the S that weekend, 300 in the Jag and after the initial amazement at the capability of the TT had worn off, only 120 in the Audi. It just had no 'one more go' factor.

I know the Audi has DSG (which is extremely good), is solid feeling and comfortable, but driving for me is all about the event, yes sometimes I just want to 'get there', but there are many times where I want to have fun on the way. Maybe the newer Audis are better, more involving, but be careful of confusing 'capable' with 'fun', since capable becomes dull after the novelty wears off.....

Try to get a longer test drive and compare the car over some roads you know well and have driven a lot in the S, if it is the car for you, good luck. But be careful you don't find yourself wishing for more excitement in a couple of months time when the sun's out and that twisty b road beckons.

Neil.H

Always funny that people use the opening and closing of a door as a measure of a car's quality. The doors on the Carerra GT are made of carbon fibre and apparently give a hollow rattle when you close them, doesn't mean it's poor quality car....This is perceived quality, rather than actual, something the manufacturers have been wise to for a while now. It's the reason why the doors on the Audi rarely fail, while the gearbox has a tendancy to explode.

Regarding the car, I reckon you'd get bored a after a month or two. There's nothing to learn or exploit, just point and squirt, over again.

SideShowB0b

I need to move!! Ive got another nurby in the car park next door, a silver in the other car park, and see at least three or four other S's a day, so its not really a rarity thing for me unfortuanately, there were actually three of us nurby's in unintentional convoy one car apart the one day!!

Its true, its a very individual thing, but I spent a long time dismissing these sorts of cars off hand, and having driven one, I was really way off in my opinion.

Edit: good points, I would definitely want a longer drive before I would even consider changing, as that was my one worry, that all the gadgetry could lose its novelty.
May try and hire one for a weekend, or try and get an extended test drive, as a short drive was brillaint fun.

billy_i_vtec

comparing an Audi A3 to the S2000 is just wrong - they are totally different cars - kind of smacks of the perpetual CTR/S2000 debate.

i'm sure the Audi is a very nice car to drive, has lots of gadgets etc and if you want a three door hatchback that can shift a bit then it's probably a good, sensible choice - horses for courses though in't it?

a Boxster S will probably give you lots of the same bells & whistles that you described in the audi but it would keep you in a soft-top with rear-wheel drive - i bet the boxster is a lot more forgiving that the S with traction control turned on etc.

have you found yourself eyeing up slippers, pipes etc lately as well

i always thought that the Audi S3 was kind of cool - taste is a strange thing.

billy_i_vtec

was this in san francisco?

gaddafi

sounds very easy to drive

that's what my g/f looks for in a car

and it's the reason I bought a 10 year old Ferrari

not a two year old NSX

whatever floats your boat, but simply going fast without any effort on my part doesn't do it for me

Crusoe

sure you'd find yourself just driving from A to B a car like the audi, after a while you'd probably not even bother to activate the sport button. Lots of very capable cars out there that can even be fun to throw down a good road a few times but so is the 1.1 curacy car you get from the garage or hire on holiday. You cain it to death and have fun with it but you'd not want one on your drive and get up early on a Sunday morning to go searching for good back roads. A good car takes time to learn and has a few quirks that gives it character. It

Nottm_S2

they're not exactly 'stirring the blood' looking motors though are they? the TT looks like a girl's (or male hairdresser's) car, the A3 looks like a 1.8 hatch, the Jag looks like an old mans motor.

all very capable in their own way i'm sure and cheap performance but if I wanted a coupe I'd get one of them there Nissan 350z's I think.. once i'd learned to live with the less revvy engine and switched off the traction control you have a very capable car which looks the dogs for only 2 or 3k more than the super-dull A3.

Plus its not an Audi so you're unlikely to get so royaly scewed for servicing and parts.


sort of opposite end of the scale to the VX220T i guess......