AudiWorld Forums - First impressions of my new A4 - likes and dislikes after first full day of driving

This being the first full day, 200 mile drive, thought I'd share my REAL first impressions.

Likes:

- Exterior looks great; getting lots of stares (for now until more are on the road). Parked next to a same color BMW 335Xi and I definitely think the A4 is classier.
- Interior - for the most part, looks and feels great. I've already gotten used to the silver plastic instrument surround. It actually is not bad at all and is better than the photos would suggest. (see Dislikes below).
- 3.2 engine - more than adequate acceleration; love the sound and smoothness; still very glad I went for the 3.2 over the 4 banger.
- Handles much better than my '01 A6 2.7t. While I'm not a race driver, I like to hang it out sometimes on the back roads and the A4 really sticks.
- Ride - while firmer than I'm used to, growing on me quickly. Just gotta watch out for New England potholes to save the 18"ers.
- Steering - while ratio at speed is greater than I'm used to, the servotronic seems a pretty good balance between low speed around town and at speed. Wasn't sure if I'd be unhappy w/o ADS and it's varying ratios but I think it's fine w/o.
- Tip - very smooth and faster shifting than my other Audis; Sport setting makes huge difference in overall feel/shift points
- B&O - sound system is phenomenal - best I've owned in a car
- Seats (standard) - also firmer than I'm used to but provides better support than my A6; no sore back or butt
- Trunk - huge - bigger than my A6 (and lots bigger than B7 A4)
- Side assist - thought it might be useless but now that I'm aware of it, helps with the blind spots
- Media/Tel interface - other than the Nav, the MMI is pretty nice with the large center screen. Also like the various option for the driver info settings. iPod connected to AMI and iPhone on Blue Tooth very easy to set up and work flawlessly. All 800 tel names and 1200 iPod songs are right there - even has Find feature to make it east to get to selection.
- Sirius Radio - jury still out on this one. I was listening to CNN on the hurricane news and a couple of other stations that were nice to have. Will decide before my free 3 months subscription is up if I want to pay the annual $140 subscription. With Sirius and XM merged, it'll be interesting to see how it all shakes out.

Dislikes:

- Rear seat area - while bigger than B7, wish it could be a couple of inches more
- Storage spaces - less than my A6 or allroad; smaller and almost useless (except for bottle holders in the doors - nice touch)
- Nav and Voice control - could they have made this any more user un-friendly? Don't like having to save voice tags for Nav, radios and entries from iPhone address book to separate car directory; Nav is difficult to use on the fly, mostly unintuitive and missing many features of my Garmin Nuvi (i.e no POI stores that I could find in the directory)!; I realize in a year or so the 3G system will be available and will have many more features and better GUI but still no touch screen. That's nuts. Using my Buvi in the A4.
- Front cupholders - the second, smaller cupholder is USELESS. Couldn't find anything that fits (maybe one of those big cups with the tiny bottoms).. The front passenger has to reach around and use the rear seat console cup holders which are better designed. They should have figured out to make 2 cup holders the same size in front. Very aggravating.
- Interior materials - some hard plastic surfaces that were obviously used for weight and cost. Not all, some, i.e. door panels. Also, the outside gas door is PLASTIC! Wow. Overall though, I still think the interior is classier than anything else around.
- Wheel Gap - I didn't order sport pkg due to avoiding too firm a ride and couldn't justify ADS for $3K or it's service risk. I would consider changing springs but only if ride is not compromised. The "Gap" doesn't bother me as much as some on the Forum, especially w/the 18" wheels.
- Would like to have had power steering wheel driver adjustments, folding mirrors, full size spare and adaptive head lamps...sigh.
- No hole in front license plate mount. Have to drive screws into the filler plate itself. Cheesy design.
- Advanced key - broken on delivery - start/stop button not working (goes in Monday to service). Doesn't always lock automatically by touching handle. This could turn out to be a pain in the arse - we'll see after it's fixed.
- That I can't hang it out for another 300 miles or so.

Overall:

9 out of 10. Despite its shortcomings, I love the car and will love it more when it's broken in (and if I can ever get the voice control figured out and advanced key working properly).