The '06 STi is nearly as good but not nearly as scary IMO.

 

I'd love to drive one. Never driven a wrx let alone an STI. I wish more of my friends had nice cars :p I really am coming to like the new STI a lot, I guess I need to find someone who owns one and get them to let me have my way with it. :D I heart teh torque.

 

~Ike your right about the handleing... The 06 feels like it has improved drasticly over the 04s. with that aside, at high speeds the car is no longer "bouncy" and all over the place like it was before. This car is so stable and the handleing just gives the driver such a connected feel to the road.

 

nice comments
as for the power the evo can put out, I remember when the evo club here in my country went to the dyno... the weakest car made easily 310hp while the average was 360hp out of 11cars:o damn, those things are really powerful...
oh yes and I agree with the interior, the STi is much better, but I'd never buy a car like that for the interior:p

 

The EVO engine has been around for a long time, and therefore has a ton of cheap modifications. Turbo back, larger turbo, and ecu tweek will do wounders. I'm not familiar with the cost of these things on the evo, but you could probably do it under 4 grand easily.

 

You can do it for under $1K if you really wanted to. To make it legal, streetable and reliable you'll need to spend at least $2k though.

 

Better pics of my 06

 

the interior is so much better than the last model... and definately much much better than the evo lol
hey your shift **** needs turning

 

I just drove the new STi today and could easily see myself in the STi as a daily driver.

The take-away from the STi is that it is ALWAYS pulling. It pulls at 2750 rpm, it pulls at 4000 rpm, it pulls at 6000 rpm (apologies to the salesperson that asked me to keep it under 5000 rpm) It pulls like the 8 does at 6500+ rpms, but it does it all the time.

The model I test drove had the "short shifter" option, and although not as precise as the 8, was not a huge drawback. The handling was great, definately on par with the RB set-up I have.

The car looks significantly better in person than it does in photos. The wing just looks like crap no matter which way you look at it. (WRX is much better)

I was totally impressed with the car's demeanor and performance. But I thought to myself...if I were to consider selling the 8 and the resulting financial hit I would take, versus investing the difference (the hit) in FI (Hymee, Greddy, Petit et. al.) and having a car that was "all show" and had the "go" to match, the 8 wins hands down IMHO.

If I had to start from scratch, then it would be a more difficult decision.

 

in my country we call it 'turbotorque' if there is such a word
...or better 'turbo-derived-torque'

 

It's prettymuch the same as last years model... It just cracks me up when people talk about the various Impreza interiors, if you listened to people on the net that don't own the car you'd think it was made out of old milk cartons. Bottom line is it's a decent looking interior that is made very well, 30k miles and nary a rattle here. Oh, and everything is placed just right (save for that extra cupholder ), Everyone that gets in my car and reads internet forums, the first thing they say is, this interior is pretty nice I don't know why people say it's so bad.

 

It gets ripped on because the STI is an expensive car, with a basic interior. People expect more, and just don't throw it in their brain that the interior is the same as the cheap affordable Impreza RS, with only fancy things swapped out to add touch. Overall, it's still a decent interior. If you compare it to cars like RX8, G35, R32, ect ect, then of course it looks cheap and lame, because compared to those it is cheap and lame. I saw an 06 STI, and the interior has improved over my 04 quite a bit. The different door panels, console, ect ect, really added changed my view, and I have to say I think the interior is very respectable. I like it a lot more then my 04.

 

I've sat in my friend's 04' (& actually drove it). No way could you describe that interior as nice. It is several grades below the RX8. Tradeoffs in every car. That being said, I have seen the inside of the new Subies quite a bit better (still a bit below the Rx8, but much improved). Obviously it uses it's R&D $ on other things (AWD, more hp, etc). Got to hand it to them though, I wish Mazda would come out with more hp to compensate. A real 255 hp 2 rotor would be appreciated.

 

the new rally car looks good...

 

It looks as if it's a good deal lower to the ground than the earlier version . It looks good nonetheless, too bad I don't get the speed channel. I can only watch rally occasionally on like ESPN2 or something like that.

 

I don't have cable, it's a pisser. I have to order the seasons on DVD. I have a lot of DVD's now!

 

Nice, however I have zero dollars to spend on DVDs. I need to win the lottery or something because this is lame right now. Almost any money I make goes towards my car. Stupid college and your not letting me work more hours. :p I'd love to actually attend a rally race, I think that would be one of the coolest forms of racing you could see first hand.

 

I would love to go to one too. I don't think I could be one of the people standing on the sides of the road though.

 

Scared, eh? I think I might stand a few feet away though as well. :p

 

scared? me? ummm, yeah...:p
http://www.motorpride.com/5thelement...rallycrash.wmv

 

Ouch, that looked less than fun. Hope everyone was ok. I guess I'll be standing lots of feet back. :p

 

no it's not. I'm not saying all this because of some photos on the net....
saw it in person. a friend of mine had the '04 (which got totaled) and now his '05 has the same interior as the '06 you get in the states. the interior is much better than the previous model, everyone sees that...

 

The '05 and the '06 interior is almost the same, if not exactly the same. What part of me saying it's almost the same as last years model did you not understand?

 

I understood everything you said, but I wrote it wrong. Let me rephrase. When I said 'previous model' I meant the '04 ...and I was compairing the interior of the '04 model with the one the '05 and '06 models get, which I like more. that's all, my mistake