Quote:
Originally Posted by Viffermike
Which the vast, vast majority of us will never operate our vehicles even close to.
Chris Harris is great, but his reviews are geared toward the hardcore enthusiast -- something most of us are not. It's nice to hear that point of view because it represents a pinnacle of sorts that we all aspire to, but most of us simply don't live in that world regularly.
In that respect, C&D's point of view -- that of a more casual enthusiast that many more people slot into -- is inherently more useful. That's by design. Any one of the phalanx of C&D staffers past or present would trade shoes with Chris Harris in a heartbeat because most are actual hardcore enthusiasts -- and we get to see glimpses of that in columns, anecdotes, and such. But they can't position their editorial that way because the majority of the readership can't relate.
It's the classic conundrum of a critic: Do I talk about what I love in my language, or do I talk about what my readers love in their language? The correct answer is the latter for any critic worth their salt.
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I agree with that, but they keep bashing BMW on how they have changed and they do not perform like they used to, but you can't rate a car's performance if you don't drive it hard (in my opinion at least) and in that case, why are they claiming that it's bad? Modern BMWs are great everyday casual cars, they're soft, silent and efficient so it should score points with them.
My point is, they are complaining about an aspect of the car which they haven't even really tested out properly. I feel like they keep emphasizing that new BMWs lack in performance when in reality they are still fastest in almost all categories (M cars).
Another funny article I saw recently was a E43 AMG beating a 540i in a comparison test (not sure if it was CD) and after taking a look at the pricing, I couldn't stop laughing. The E43 was around 96k, that is about 25k more expensive than the 540i that it competes with. A fully loaded M550i (which will destroy the E43 in every possible way) is cheaper than the E43. I feel like MB is really paying big bucks to some of these magazines. Also, GLC43 came in at 71k in another recent test.. this is a X3 M40i competitor, their prices are ridiculous.