I have driven BMW's for the last 6 years. I currently have a 2002 540i 6spd and a 1996 840ci. I researched BMW's for 2 years prior to being able to own/afford them and knew a whole lot about them before I started buying them. I want to trade my 8-series on a 911 (996) but I do not know all that much about them. Little things such as knowing if a certain car has sport/premium/comfort packages by looking at the steering wheel/head unit/shifter. Does the 3 or 4 spoke steering wheel on a 911 denote sport package as on BMW's or different wheels for different years? Sport seats? Premium sound? If there is anything that can be told about the car by looking at it, can someone please post these tells? I hate to sound ignorant about these things, but I have admired the 911 for some time, but have never done research on them. I appreciate any help.

Also, are there any problems with 99's as the first 996's that should be watched out for? Any reason to purchase '00 - '01 over a '99?

By the way, I am selling a 1996 BMW 840ci with only 18,650 miles on it. BLK/BLK absolute mint condition inside and out. If anyone is interested, please message me. Thanks again for any help.

 

Congrats on wanting to move to a 996. BMW's are fine cars, but completely different from a Porsche.

To answer some of your questions, the amount of spokes in the steering wheel are about the year of the car, not options. As for premium sound, 2002 was the first year of the Bose system. As for other options, there are literally hundreds. For example, my car has a partial carbon fiber (CF) option: CF shifter, CF steering wheel, CF door sills, and CF brake handle. There are other CF parts that were available with other CF pkgs. You also could get either wood or aluminum on the same parts. There were two different leather interiors, standard or supple. Heated seats, lumbar support, auto-dimming mirror, navigation, colored gauges, different wheels are also a few of the options you can get. This is what makes Porsches unique, there are no two alike because of the hundreds of options/personalized way you can get one.

As far as being able to tell what options one has, you are going to have to look at the car and see them. For example two buttons at the bottom/forward part of the console are for the seat heaters, the side of the seat will have a **** to adjust the lumbar support, the rear view mirror will have a button to turn on the auto-dimming, etc, you get the drift.

I am including a couple of links that list options:

http://www.911turbo.com/turboclub/docs/prices.html click the "New Car Prices": , "2002 Porsche 911 Turbo AWD (Aug 10, 2001)" link.

http://auto.consumerguide.com/Auto/N...2/Act/Showall/

Good luck in your search!

 

Thats what I was looking for...thanks a lot.

Billy, you have a turbo? I am trying to justify spending the money on one, but I (my wife) can't! As a second car the turbos may still be a little more than I am looking to spend, but the longer I look, the more I want to get one. I have not driven one -- night and day difference I bet...what year did they start making the turbos in a cab? Anyway, thanks for the info and have a good one.