Need Feedback from S4 owners

[gymwarrior]

Hi. Newbie here ,...from way up in Montreal.

I'm doing my "homework"....narrowing down my choices for my next car. I would really appreciate feedback from you guys (or girls !) on your S4's (2006 + models).
How do you like your car ? Still happy with your choice ?

I'd love to hear any positives and of course the NEGATIVES too. I'm a little paranoid of reliability issues.

Thank you !

Marc

[audiowner]

No negatives !!!
Awesome car

Buy one & enjoy while you can.
Be prepared to do a lot of re-fueling stops
They like their "juice" & plenty of it

[cvap]

It is an awesome car,I've had no problems.Though snow tires w/wheels are expensive.You gotta have em if using car in winter.

[NoYerRole2]

love my car too, no probs.

[scythe1969]

I've had my car for 6 weeks - I switched from an e36 M3 and chose my S4 over a bump up to the e46 M3. The car is definitely the nicest car I've owned - the creature comforts and tech are off the charts. I would have to say that beyond the performance/handling and overall fit and finish the only Achilles heel that this car has is the MPG - in the climate that we're in, with gas prices, it's definitely a BIG con. I'm lucky that we don't have children and make good money because I would definitely feel the pinch otherwise. I am currently getting 16mpg in the city and on a trip to SF (in sixth gear for the most part) I was able to eek out a mere 20MPG. By contrast my M3 netted me 21 in the city and I would see upwards of 31 on the highway if I drove it responsibly. I'm finding that I'm filling up once a week with my driving habits, so the bottom line is that its costing me $460 a month in gas...

If you can afford it - I would recommend it but it's definitely something to think about.

[buntybull]

I did not buy my S4 new. It was a demo, I guess, with about 6k km in it. The salesman who was driving it said he could not get a reliable, smooth 1-2 shift out of the manual, and that is true if you don't run up the revs enough in gear 1.

I traded an A4 B6 with 1.8T for my S4, so I knew a lot about blipping the throttle to get off the line, and about living life over 3,000 rpm just to be near the turbo kick-in.

I thought at the time that living life with a German V8 could require fewer rpm (like north american V8's), but it is happiest in the same higher rpm ranges as the little turbo I had before it. Although it is normally aspirated, the variable valve timing gives a nice turbo-like kick right through the torque peak at 3500.

So really all I gave up with the A4 is the blipping off the line. I can dump the clutch on the S4 and it will grunt away, and very quickly be racing through 4000 rpm.

The best thing about the 4.2 though is the 5-4-3-2 downshift from dizzyingly fast speeds. I save a lot of brake leather with this, and the sound is out of this world.

All in all this car is happiest when changing speed or direction, the more quickly the changes the better. Nothing is more boring than a constant speed on a straight road in 6th gear.