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      04-27-2012, 01:21 PM   #272
Obioban
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Quote:
Originally Posted by AW128i View Post
Or he'll suffer because the wifey will not like it. In my experience, people who are iffy about driving a manual transmission revert back to an auto if they have the opportunity. The auto 128i isn't horrible, it's just not quite as fun as the manual version. Don't be fooled, however, you can have plenty of fun in an auto.
I've had the opposite experience-- most people who are iffy about manuals are iffy because they've never owned one, so they've never had a chance to get proficient. It's pretty much impossible to get actually good at driving stick without owning a stick car and DDing it for a couple months. Until you're good at it, it's not really a better experience than the auto.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Bimmer-Bob View Post
It looks like these days the manual is a no-cost option. That's kind of a shame, because when I bought you had to pay extra for an auto. I mean, I would've ordered the manual no matter what, but of course it's always nice to be saving some dough (~$1200 in this case, IIRC). Maybe that's why the base price of the 128i seems to be creeping up? It used to be that opting for the manual was a sure fire way to shave a thousand bucks or so off a new car's final price, but many makes seem to be eliminating the price advantage of the MT.
The manual is still lighter and more involving than the slush box.

DCT feels like an auto, it just doesn't have the parasitic loss of the slush box. At least back with SMG you still had to work for it.
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