Subject: Other points Author: ghw : member since September, 2006 : 106 posts Posted on: 2008-05-22 16:54:43

As an owner of two e34 530s and an e60 530, here is my take:

The e60 gets rack & pinion steering which makes the steering feel much better than the e34 - especially on center steering response.

The e60 has much better low end torque, you'd expect the v8 to do better, but the M54 wins.

The e60 is considerably lighter, larger, yet gets better gas mileage. 4 adults can ride in the e60 comfortably. I've never felt like there was loads of leg room for moderately tall passengers in the rear of the e34 - especially when sitting behind a moderately tall driver.

The e34 has, imho, one of the best layouts for hvac controls - simple, easy to use, and configurable. the e60 however maintains all the configuration options but hides them all in idrive. The newer idrives bring common hvac controls (temp & fan speed) out onto the center stack so you don't have to use idrive to access them - good move on bmws part. The one thing idrive does get you, my wife doesn't like the same hvac settings as I do - the car changes the settings with the key. On the e34 everything is so simple it only takes a second to change so you don't need a computer to remember them for you.

Insurance price for the two is identical. I don't understand why.

To add a cd changer to the e60, the dealer has to reprogram the car to accept it. Seems like poor system engineering to me - it could a limitation of MOST that the master needs to know all the nodes before starting.

the e60 had electronic throttle - I'm not a big fan of electronic throttle, but its much better than the early ones which seemed to have a huge lag between driver input and response. The e34 throttle response still seems (is) much better. On the other side, the cruise on the e60 is much more consistent.

I haven't had a chance to work on the e60 at all, so that may lead to some different views once I do.

Gareth

• Nothing like a little perspective. Also, I am going to hell... - dave535i 2008-05-11 10:11:46 (179 views)
  • Other points - ghw 2008-05-22 16:54:43 (63 views)
  • Our cars look better too. - kfister 2008-05-15 14:38:42 (56 views)
  • I drove my friend's '03 740i and was shocked -- - dougmcc 2008-05-15 13:30:12 (83 views)
  • Re: Nothing like a little perspective. Also, I am going to hell... - yaofeng 2008-05-13 22:19:02 (80 views)
  • Well stated Dave! (nt) - e34jef 2008-05-13 07:54:35 (45 views)
  • Re: Nothing like a little perspective. Also, I am going to hell... - cloudnine 2008-05-12 17:46:39 (79 views)
  • I came to the same conclusion - rick540 2008-05-11 18:00:46 (98 views)
    • I agree but...... - louiseven 2008-05-13 20:38:13 (79 views)