Speed-1

Drive both, for me no question worth every penny!

gamegenie

• If you want luxury over sporty go with the A3.
• If you want a little sporty but mostly luxury get the A3 Prestige, or equip the A3 with the Sports Package.
• If you want more sporty over luxury go with the S3.
• If you want the pure sports car, no luxury, wait for the RS3 aka Clubsport A3.
• If you want the fuel saving car with a spice of luxury get the A3 Clean Diesel.
• If you want the pure energy saving car wait for the E-tron Hatchback A3.

Spoonie G

Doesn't the S3 have every luxury item that the A3 has? The S3 seems like the best of both worlds

Antarius

Well, my decision was slightly easier since I wanted the convertible. The. Choice was between getting the A3 now or waiting for the POSSIBILITY of getting an S3 cab.

Most everyone here is a "car enthusiast" no reason to make fun of people that didn't want to spend extra on the S model. Here are my reasons for not waiting.

Bigger breaks are good, but being able to fit 17 inch winter tires (or even 16s) is also a nice option and will save you a couple hundred. I haven't heard of anyone fitting 17s over the s3s brakes, but there are definitely people running 16s on their a3s (the wheel I wanted, came in smallest at 17).

The base speed of the A3 is underwhelming in drive, but decent in sport. After my first oil change I will likely get the car tuned. S3 is a pretty fast car as is, and I probably wouldnt spend money upgrading the performance. Compared to a 335 or An Evo, the a3 is not going to be fun enough, but it's still sportier than 90% of the other cars on the road, it's "good enough" to put you into any hole in traffic. Pushing the car to 100% is not safe on a public road. That's "good enough" for most people.

Magnetic ride would be nice, but the a3 sport suspension is a nice compromise, softer than the s3 in dynamic, much harder/fun than the a3 without it. Looks good and still handling 4+ inches of unplowed winter roads without plowing.

Looks wise, I do not like the look of the s-line on the A3, nor do I trust the long-term reliability of the LED headlights, I was happy to be able to stick to a lower level package to save money for things that I didnt want.

For things like a backup camera, I'd rather pay 250 than 1400, no arguments there... Auto-parking would be nice if you couldnt.... But most car enthusiasts are going to put in the effort to learn.

Antarius

Having driven around in a base a3 without the sport suspension, the thing glides over roads... Hits potholes and you barely feel them. Feels pretty luxurious.

jeff968

Well said, but some people.......

Anyway, surprised to hear you say the A3 performance is underwhelming. My B7 A4 S-line with the 2.0T and ONLY 200hp is very spirited. But maybe that is because it is mated to the 6 speed manual? The based A3 with 220 hp on tap in a smaller car should be even better. I've only driven a couple of S3s and they were crazy fast. I have to get some seat time on this A3 sport at my local dealer and compare.

DennisMitchell

Magnetic Ride suspension has to be at least a $1000 value if you were to retrofit such technology.

Antarius

My last 3 cars all were manual, and all felt more powerful, first a tuned/gutted 3rd gen Mitsubishi Eclipse which was about only about 260 HP but good torque from the V-6 (and so much torque steer that it would rip the wheel out of your hands if you weren't ready/paying attention and floored it). Then I drove a tuned Evo X GSR that went from 220 hp at the wheels to just over 300 at the wheels on a dyno after intercooler/piping/intake/exhaust/tune but was a ****ty daily driver because the 5th gear was "designed" for 55mph, not highway cruising... and then my next car was the BMW 335 (which I never modified but was more than powerful enough), and yes, you're right a lot of it has to do with going from manual to the DSG. Like I said, performance is fine in sport mode where it holds revs. When the engine is shifting at 2500-3k in D it just doesn't feel good at all but is just fine for mindlessly cruising along after a hard day of work..

arU4ic

Man, you got THAT right!

jeff968

Really?

As I posted earlier, EPA mileage for the S3 is 26/31 and the A3 is 27/33, hardly a difference. If the S3 gets much worse "real world" mileage then that can only be because the owners are enjoying all 292hp!