[seis-speed]

I am a manual person, familiarity makes me lean toward BMW. I would love to hear people's thoughts on Audi manual vs BMW manual. I have driven both, but I am so used to the BMW that when I drove the Audi it felt less engaged, the clutch seemed long, I am wondering how it feels after getting used to the car?

[xugator]

I have driven the S4 also and have walked away with the same thing you have and that is that it is not as engaging as the BMW. I am strictly a manual person also and enjoyed the BMW much more than the Audi. I was not familiar with either before I drove them both

[Yay-Z]

I prefer the bmw 6mt. I get a better feel for when its in gear. The audi is kind of rubbery.

Both have pretty long clutch travel. I modified my 335i with a clutch stop and changed the cdv.

[omarliendo]

Seis-Speed, i absolutely loved the S4 and i was going to go with that one but the 335 has something else that puts it over the top. I am ordered my 335i and i can't wait to get it!

[uhn2000]

Really a great question and something I am also pondering. Not everyday you walk into a BMW dealership and they a 335 manual to test and almost never seen an s4 or A4 manual to test.

[tony20009]

If they don't have one, go in, give them a deposit (usually $1000, which since you are in the market for a car, you have that much available), order one, drive when it arrives and get your money back if you don't like it. You aren't bound to take/keep any car ordered until you signed the deal and driven the car off the lot. If you decide on the other car before the one you ordered arrives, just go get your deposit back and cancel the order.

By the way, before ordering, negotiate the price down as far as you can. They will want you to sign the order. You make them sign it too. At that point, you have a unquestionable tool you can take with you to a competing dealership and negotiate the price down even further as the competitor will know that what you say you can buy the car for is fact rather than heresay.

Obviously there is timing involved. Don't run to the competitor the day after you placed the order. You can wait until the first dealer calls you to say the car is there. Tell him you will be in in two days. He can't sell that car to anyone else until you come in to settle or cancel the deal they signed with you.

Note this process can make it take longer to actually take delivery of the car, but you can be sure you'll get it at the lowest price at which it can possibly be had because you are forcing the dealers to compete on a price basis with each other on an identical product. Something they absolutely hate doing, something seen in the fact that it's very hard to find two exactly identical cars on two different dealers' lots. Even if the dealer has to install some accessory or wheels or whatever (even if you make them remove it, they will need you to pay for the labor to do so -- there is no end to what car dealers will do to try justifying your having to pay more than whatever amount you want to pay), they will do something to make their car or their service different from their competitors so as to create some scant basis for telling you their car is different and you should thus pay more. Beware, the second you move to consider a car different from the one on your sales order, is the same second you compromise your bargaining leverage.

Sometime ago (at least a year ago), I posted in great detail about this topic, including points you can use to strengthen your bargaining position. Use advanced search on my ID and you'll find it.