Well I'm taking the plunge today. Excited and nervous. As I'm not in a huge hurry to get my car, I decided to order exactly what I want. Here's what I'm planning:

6 Spd Manual
Titanium Gray
Red & Black Leather
Grand Touring Package
Rear Wing/Spoiler
Rotary Accent Package
6 Disc CD Changer

Undecided on:
Nav System
Appearance Package
Polished Wheels (not sure if even available yet)

I would appreciate any thoughts you guys have, especially on my undecideds. Thanks.

 

Nav is a consideration I spose.. but for me it's not worth $2000 extra. The appearance package is a love it or hate it thing... I personally don't like it because it detracts from lines of the car, but that's just me.

The polished wheels? Nah.. not for that price. It's obscenely expensive to get them and the stock wheels look nice anyway

You can get nice chrome aftermarket ones if you want them, or hell.. even have your stock wheels chromed for less. I'd go that route.

 

You are getting more than I did, as I just went with the GT package, no nav, spoiler, etc.

I like the looks as they are, but that is my preference. The appearance package looks good from the pics, have not seen one in person.

Nav to me is an expensive toy. If I lived in a big city, my opinion might change. I can buy a lot of accessories for 2 grand.

Congrats on your decision to buy an RX-8, it is one sweet ride.

 

The way you've decided to equip your car sounds fine to me. I have the NAV, Appearance Package and Polished Wheels. The NAV is fine if you can use it practically, toehrwise it is just a nice toy.
I personally like the Appearance Package and if you decide on it, order it with the car. it will be cheaper than doing it after.
The Polished Wheels are KILLER! Of the three options, I would say go for the wheels. What I did was to get my dealer to "buy back" the standard wheels that they could then have polished or chromed and sell to someone else. This dropped the price by $600.00 leaving a difference of $1,400.00.
In order to offset the cost of the wheels, you might consider foregoing the 6-CD player and go for the MP3 which ais a couple of hundred less. I have not added one yet but intend to as I've been told that a single CD will hold much more music than all 6 CDs in a changer. Also, you get to pick exactly what music you wnat. I was also tole the quality of the sound was better but that remains to be seen. Hope this helps.

 

Speaking of adding things on later, one consideration is that the appearance package and polished wheels can easily be added later on (ableit more expensively), while it will be a royal pain and very expensive to add the NAV afterwards.

---jps

 

boowana, do you have a picture of your entire car w/ the polished wheels? I would love to see it. Thanks.