I've had a handful of boxsters and this current one is a tiptronic. For everyday driving the Tip is king and surprisingly sporty. For pure weekend blasts I would pick the 5 or 6 speed. I've also had a handful of BMWs the BMW would make a better week end, week day car and I truly believe the BMW is a sporty drivers car. The BMW 6 cylinder is very reliable but not so sure about the SMGs, Out of the SMG cars, I like the ones in the 330i 335i and the 550i. I'm driving a M5 today with a SMG and although the car is powerful I'm not liking the way the SMG feels in daily driving compared to the 330i with SMG.

double post

The E46 is still a great looking car. I'd take the M in a heartbeat over the Boxster.

if it was the same number of miles....

And yes dont knock the porsche tip that much, manual is better, but the auto is nowhere near as bad as many make it out to be, also many of these have never driven with one. I have gotten to know the shift points on mine so well that i can shift perfectly with just my right foot and nothing else still in auto mode. You get used to the degree of angle that the tip calculates for up shifts and down shifts, it is actually fairly exhilarating. Despite this though, when in manual mode the tiptronic is really really impressive for its age, the shifting is quick, about as good as Mercedes paddles from a year or two back. Many many journalist complain about how terribly slow semi autos are on cars of this age, pleauging everything from the smart roadster to Maserati. Many companies are just recently surpassing porsches outdated tiptronic while the pdk simply blows the doors off of most any transmission system out their. It is very nice in traffic to own a tip, and if i had to have an auto i must say the porsche tip is a very very good one.

The M3 has more value, the Boxster will still be more fun to drive. I had a rather amazing experience piloting a students 2003 Tip around a racetrack. A very fun car.

You need to add one more choice. For me it's neither of the two.

The E46 M3's have their own issue as we do with our cars. We have IMS issue and the E46 M3's have Crankshalf or Connecting rods breaking off. BMW did extend their warranty to 100k miles to cover the issue but after 100k it's no longer covered. Affected models are 2000-2003. 2004 or later are not affected.

Base Boxster Tip? I have a 2002 S Tip and it's ok even in manual mode. It's just not as fun. My brother has a 2003 base Tip and it sure could use some power.

lol - The OP has a base with tip. This is a tough crowd.

I've always liked the e46 M3. I probably would hold out for an S with 6 speed. But if I needed a back seat, the M car is a good choice. Although, I think the maintenance on an M with 127K miles will make the Boxster look inexpensive by comparison.


/

M3 DD and 986 weekend car. If limited to one car it's M3 all day long!

Also despite the m3s extra doors and back seat, I would imagine insurance to be higher.

Should I have refrained from ringing in? :p

Merely my opinion, but I feel like roadsters are supposed to be true to their design. Porsche designed a small roadster with a rigid chassis, precise steering and firm "ish" suspension. It is supposed to be a sports car. 227hp is plenty to have fun with when mated to a proper gearbox.

Don't get me wrong, I am not against automated manuals or even flappy paddles (I use the buttons on my Lex GS regularly). I also think PDK is a great tool for going fast, it does what I want to do better than I can do it. Still, I prefer a manual because I want to be a better driver, not just have better tech. I have driven the Tip on a base and an S car and it did nothing for me on either, but the base especially needs a close ratio manual because of the lack of low end torque.

If I'm in a small 2 seater, it should be sporty. While the E46 is not a 2 seater it is most definitely sporty.

The 03 boxster base tip is certainly a beautiful and nice car, but a Honda Accord EX of the same year will beat it to 60 and through the quarter.

It's hard to justify the exotic maintenance failures of these cars when a Japanese family sedan will out accelerate them. When was the last time you heard of an Accord engine that grenaded? If the thing has the potential to blow up, at least make it a rocket...

can that isuse be addressed without pulling/splitting the engine?
If not then it's not really an equivalent issue from a second-hand buyer's perspective. IMS is addressed in one day at the shop and has been done by DIY'ers with no experience taking down transmissions.

Uh the comparison is that you get 104HP per liter with an 2001 M3, for that kind of performance I can except that it may be a bit high strung in terms of maintenance.

2003 Boxster Base gives you 83.3 HP per liter (Yawn)...

Let's not pretend the the IMS is the only mode of failure for these engine, because it's not.

I love Porsches and I love Boxsters...but they are long on shortcomings for their performance. The Base tip has all of the shortcomings with the least performance.

PORSCHE: It's all about emotions, not numbers!
You either fall in love or you don't, explaining is pointless.

PORSCHE (e.g. Boxster) vs "any other make (e.g. BMW e46 M3)" = 1:0

just my 2 cents :D

No there's no way to address this other than an engine tear down. This is not an equivalent issue. This is why I vote "Neither".

Sure I indicated earlier that the 3.2 and E46 were similar on the time sheets.

But I don't think I would say that a lowered powered 986 is a yawner.
It's down to the power/weight. The 2.5 for instance has the least power of all but can stick in the mirrors of a base 987 built as many as 12 years later.
With a few weight savings mods, legal in some AX classes, and some sticky tires and you're at ~2,600 lbs. -- striking distance of a 2,550 lb. SpecBoxster that no one thinks is boring.
Obviously these weights are not possible with a tip. But less power alone does not make for a boring ride. For a weekend car, I think a 2.5 can be tricked out to be an extremely fast car.
Street legal R-comps, LSD, some worthwhile mods, and the possibility of dropping as many as 150-200 lbs., I'll take that over a newer (by year) E46 all day.

My BHP per liter analysis was strictly intended to demonstrate the low relative output of our cars for the considerable potential input of maintenance.

104 per liter in a N/A engine is indeed quite a feat. (my wife's Abarth has 114BHP per Liter, but is turboed).

The 78.1BHP per liter of the 3.2 or the 83BHP per litre of the 2.7 or the 80BHP per liter of the 2.5 is downright sad for such a fragile engine. With such "low strung" numbers, it should be more robust.

well de-tuned engine does not mean "go and make the most power you can"...
They're looking for an engine that can survive four years without threatening more expensive Porsches.
I'd say they achieved both goals. Good job Fritz.
But to be honest, that's not the point of a roadster. The emphasis is grip and handling.
The Boxster is the still the only Porsche that converges RWD, low COG, and MID engine handling.
M3 power would be nice but this car sets the bar in its class which the M3 and "other" Porsches can not say.

Neither. ;)

No one buys a boxster for straight line speed simply not what its about :ah: the power arguments are invalid. The question here is does your friend want a high power sport sedan or a well handling roadster, both excel in diffrent areas because they are different kinds of cars. Can you really complain that it takes the same time as a honda accord to do a quarter mile when you get to hear a flat six the whole way their? Can you really complain that you own a car that you can actually drive spiritedly on the road without putting yourself 50 over the speed limit. All while enjoying top down motoring at its best while you hear the engine from the drivers side air intake, as you pass a long white picket fence beside a winding road you hear the engine echo back to you off of each individual fence post, the echo growing faster as you press harder onto the accelerator.:cheers: