BMW SE vs. M Sport ride quality

[jr1104]

I tested both a Sport and an SE before buying the E91 330i touring SE that we now own.
For me, I found the ride of the Sport unacceptable.
The SE not only has softer suspension, but also rides on 17" higher profile tyres. For all that, it still seems to handle fine on a backroad.

Some other thoughts:
- Changing the RFTs to a set of 4 CSC3s about 4 months ago. It has improved the ride, but it's certainly not night and day. It's mainly smoothed out small road imperfections. With worse roads, I don't believe you'd be able to tell. Another side effect has been that they are a LOT quieter
- Mine is an older 2006, so pre-LCI. It has the older Sat Nav, and whilst the directions that it has are fine, it does NOT have postcode entry, which sometimes drives me nuts, as it makes initial entry of the destination to be so awful that I sometimes wish to take a hammer to it. Why anyone would have paid £2k for this upfront I'll never know. I'd suggest you save your cash and buy a TomTom
- Excluding the exterior differences, the main difference that I could see between the SE and sport were the steering wheel (much nicer looking in the sport) and the seats, which are simply ace. As it happens, my SE had been specced with the Sport seats, which to me are much more important than the lousy SatNav. Ref the steering wheel, don't ask me why, but I found the steering to be a bit numb in the Sport. Don't know whether that is down to the steering wheel itself, or something else in the suspension/steering rack.

Any other questions, feel free to ask.

Interesting that you mention about the satnav. My current one doesn't do postcode search either, but it's never been too much of an issue. My main reason for wanting I-drive though was to get one with the USB option so I can play music from my USB pen. I know the post LCI one has a built in hard drive, but is USB an option at all on pre LCI I-drive?

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

Interesting that you mention about the satnav. My current one doesn't do postcode search either, but it's never been too much of an issue. My main reason for wanting I-drive though was to get one with the USB option so I can play music from my USB pen. I know the post LCI one has a built in hard drive, but is USB an option at all on pre LCI I-drive?

Dunno. My car has a mini-jack phono socket which is wired to the in-car stereo. I just connect up an old Ipod for my music.

 

[[TW]Fox]

Interesting that you mention about the satnav. My current one doesn't do postcode search either, but it's never been too much of an issue. My main reason for wanting I-drive though was to get one with the USB option so I can play music from my USB pen. I know the post LCI one has a built in hard drive, but is USB an option at all on pre LCI I-drive?

USB interface is option code 6FL. It is independant of iDrive - ie, it can be fitted to cars without iDrive and iDrive fitted cars can lack it.

 

[Mackass]

I have an E92 M-Sport 19" with RFT fronts.

I actually find it tiring to drive as you are constantly looking out for and swerving to avoid potholes and drains. As hitting one will result in a cracked alloy or a large earthquake through the car.

 

[jr1104]

USB interface is option code 6FL. It is independant of iDrive - ie, it can be fitted to cars without iDrive and iDrive fitted cars can lack it.

Cheers Fox. Is the use of a USB drive any good without the I-drive screen, or is it just going to be too fiddly to search through 10GB of music?

Doing a quick search doesn't show many cars with the USB option mentioned either.