JZ

To begin I must mention that the salesmen said it did not have its performance chip in it for whatever reason, so my opinion on the acceleration will have to be tempered by that fact.

Build quality: Absolutely awesome. Every panel is perfectly tight, no flaws anywhere.

Interior: Similar to Eclipse although less plasticy and cheap looking. Gauges and such are plasticy, but not too bad. Leather seats are quite nice. Tons of head room, good compfort up front, barely any space in the rear.

Exterior: Very nice looking car. Looks like a quality automobile. Crappy tires.

Handling: Very good, actually. You could live with this handling without having to upgrade. Nice and tight, firm suspension but doesn't rattle your bones. I'm sure it would be harsher with low profile tires on it. Turns quickly, although not as go-cart like quickly as the Celica GTS.

Clutch and shifter: You have to let the clutch out way too far to engage it!!! Shifter is only so so. Not very smooth--more ratchety. Short throws are nice. Gera shift knob is tacky and plasticy.

Exhaust note and engine note: nice from the outside but not very noticeable on the inside. Could be a bit louder.

Stereo: Not bad. Having that sub soesn't do much for the overall sound though.

Performance: Well, let's just say they were telling the truth about it not having the performance chip in it. It seemed that they were for real since they tried to take it back to the shop and have it done but they were too busy and it won't be ready until tomorrow. I'll have to drive it again after that.
It takes a long time to get up to redline and there is no really noticeable difference in sound at higher rpms like ours. I won't say anymore until I'm sure of the performance state of the car. In t he form that I drove it in it would be difficult to call it a fast car.

Overall, though, if I were in that market I would buy that car in a second. The build quality is so much better than ours.

Sticker for the S was 23650. Not too bad. I'm sure it will be awhile before they drop the price on this one. There were lines of people waiting to drive them.

GoldTypeS_RENAMED

What chip? I don't get it? So, was there just something wrong with this one? Doesn't say a whole lot about build quality to me?

"could be a bit louder"???

That's high praise for a 4cyl. They're usually annoyingly loud to me.

JRock

Says the man who doesn't want the Comptech exhausts. j/k

Yeah I saw them at the dealer today too. Nice little cars. Good price, nice interior, etc.
Didn't get a chance to testdrive one, but I was only there a short while and besides I've never driven a stick before.

-J

JZ

From what I could gather, Acura left the chips out purposefully so that the cars couldn't be sold right away. I guess it was kind of a way to keep them from leaving the dealer the first day so people could see them and put down deposits.

I don't know--that's my best guess. No one there really knew why they had to have the performance chips put in. But, the guy who took me out said they ripped them up last Saturday at FedEx field where they have professional dirvers come out and let the sales reps. tear em up in road courses. He said when he drove it there it felt very fast but the one at the dealership felt sluggish. Maybe there's something to this. I still don't get it though.

But, in terms of build quality, the chips were left out on purpose. It's not like it was a defect. Trust me--go see one in person and you'll realize why I claim they have excellent build quality!!

NOVAwhiteTypeS

Performance chip? hmm.. sounds like a gimmick! may be he just said that because the car isn't broken into. I do know that the ecu has alot of impact on the enginge since it's an ivtec but why would honda/acura put a defecto on the show room. also what if it gave a problem while your testdriving it.

Did the sales guy see you driving your S? probably so. so he just didn't want you to have a bad impression of the car, so he pulled the 'performance chip' crap!

I wish our cars would have 'performace chips' so when I don't want to speed I can just take it out.

JZ I believe in everyone you said, and thank you for the reviewe but that salesmen should get shot for givng such BS!

JZ

I'm telling you, Acura is doing something on purpose for whatever reason. The manager actually took the car to the shop while I was there to have them do the work but they couldn't do it until tomorrow.

I will get to the bottom of this. I'm going to talk to my mechanic tomorrow and get the real answer.

All I know is that if that was all the RSXS had in terms of power than something is very wrong here b/c my car would have stomped that thing into itsy bitsy pieces.

Don't worry--we'll figure this out yet. Now I'm really curious.

GoldTypeS_RENAMED

I'll be interested in hearing the whole story. Do you think there's any chance that you're just used to torque! But seriously, the Celica GT-S is damn close to being as fast as a stock CL-S, yet when I drove it I thought it felt like an Accord V6 would stomp its ass. It felt ridiculously slow and I think that's cuz it's just a 4 banger.