S-line TDI 184 Quattro - Initial Impressions

Thought I'd give a short initial review of the new motor even though I've only had a couple of hours it.

Interior: well we all know it's great so I won't dwell on this. I have the standard biathlon seats and I find them very comfy so far.
Could maybe do with a bit more support for enthusiastic cornering though. I suggest interior LED lighting pack is a must too.

Engine/Gearbox: the TDI 184 is a peach but is very different to my petrol GTi so I have to readjust to its personality. Quite sluggish at very low revs so needs a heavier foot to get it going but suddenly the grunt kicks in and it flies. I suspect I'll have to use the paddles more than I used to, even in auto mode, just to drop down a gear occasionally. Start/Stop freaked me out so I had to disable it for the time being!
I would not really describe this model as 'fun'. It's more of a motorway muncher. Maybe the S3 and 1.8 or 1.4 petrols are more frisky and 'fun', though TBH if I was looking for a really fun car I wouldn't have gone for an A3 at all.

SE suspension: for me, perfect. It is softer over the terrible roads we have around here and yet doesn't seem to compromise the handling at all (compared to the sport set up I test drove). If I look carefully I can see that it sits higher over the wheels but I really don't care about that. Sacrificing desired comfort for the sake of perceived looks would be absurd.

LED lights: I love them! They look so cool even when they're off. They give a lovely white light at night which is what I was after. Still need to experience their advanced functions though. I wouldn't say they are 'better' than Xenons, just different.

AMI/SatNav: with the tech pack I got a very good quality display and the nav display is full of good detail. I am used to a touch screen so don't yet find the controls as simple to use. One thing I always did was drag the map with my finger to look miles ahead on the road to see if there were any jams. But in the A3 the car's position seems to stay central on the screen no matter what buttons I press. Am I missing a scroll function?
Disappointed that I can't get my iPhone5 connected through AMI to play music but now that I have discovered that I can play FLAC off USB thumb drives (and I guess SD cards, which I don't have yet) or copy them to the car's HDD I am happy enough.

B&O: Wow! The contrast with my crappy standard Golf stereo is night and day. Will sound even better once I've run the speakers in.

Colour: I know I have a 'Marmite' colour but I love that I am unlikely to meet any A3's the same colour so I have a feeling of exclusivity.

All in all absolutely delighted but still many hours of discovery to go, and that's going to be the fun part!

cemerson said:

In the map view, press the main dial down, then you can use the touch pad on top of it to scroll the cursore around the map. It re-centers the map view over wherever you have the cursor every now and then.

Click to expand...

Ah! Many thanks, will try tomorrow (I had completely forgotten I even have the touch pad!)

TDI-line said:

Not sure why, my Iphone5 was paired with the blue tooth and plays music from the device.

And i'm not really technically minded.

Great write up.

Click to expand...

Thanks! Bluetooth music works fine but I want to use a higher quality method to make best use of B&O. B&O's downside is that it tends to make poor source music sound even poorer.

I did put it into dynamic drive mode and this seemed to switch the gearbox to S (correct behaviour?) but I'm still being gentle with it with only 100 miles on the clock.

I'm a lazy old ****** so always have it in D and let the box do the work. This suited me perfectly in the GTi but I suspect I'll need to work this box a little more. But I do agree that when I do bother to use the paddles it makes me grin!