Talking about regular WRX 2005, my friends tell me there is a lag for turbo in autos by 1 sec. He said its stupid to buy the automatic version. I am prob never going to race really.

Will there be a fix for this lag in 2006 or 07 model?

Thanks!

There is no fix for turbo lag.
Both the manual and auto experience turbo lag, it's got NOTHING to do with the transmission.
Teach your friend about forced induction by turbochargers as a favor.

Please get the manual transmission, it's a sin to consider an auto even.

yes get a manual. All my friends made me goto church and repent.
:(

I never drove a manual. You think its wise to get couple of lessons?

I never drove a manual. You think its wise to get couple of lessons?

Yes, it would be very wise to get a couple of lessons, the WRX clutch isn't as forgiving in the long run as something like an econobox clutch.

get much much practice as ray said, its not forgiving

and as for my two cents, manual wrx...only way to go

I haven't owned a manual tranny car prior to WRX, although I knew how to drive them, but it's different when you drive it everyday vs. few times a year on someone else's car. You'll pick up pretty quickly. It's true that it's not quite as forgiving as, say Honda Accord's manual tx, but manual is manual, you'll get used to it.

I have driven a Saab 9-2x (auto) at autoshow in motion, and boy...it felt slow for some reason. I can't imagine driving a turbo car on auto...you just NEED to be able to shift at your will, not the transmission's. Don't even think about auto on wrx, please. You'll regret it dearly. And when you want to sell it.... I'm not sure who'd wanna buy it.

Manual.

I'd vote against an automatic transmission on almost *any* car. Automatics take all the fun out of driving. You can't choose your own gear, you can't access the available power at will, and you can't anticipate your exact throttle response. Manual = control. Control = fun.

I second that.
When I drive my wife's car, I keep on looking for the clutch with my left foot...but it's not there. Sad.

Hahah! Yeah, when I go to start an automatic, I almost always slam my left foot into the floorboard because I forget there's no clutch pedal.

I always slam my left foot into the break because they're so damn huge in autos!:grinno:

I'd vote against an automatic transmission on almost *any* car. Automatics take all the fun out of driving. You can't choose your own gear, you can't access the available power at will, and you can't anticipate your exact throttle response. Manual = control. Control = fun.

Actually, drove the 2005 Legacy last week with the sport-tronic shifting....was kinda fun since you can either 'manual' shift or leave it to the auto transmission.

Those manual/auto combos are so slow to shift, though. I drove the Skyline in Japan with one of those, and I wanted to tear my eyeballs out it was so slow. And lots of other American cars, but most of those were family sedans, so the slowness was expected.

Well, I guess we'll have to wait a few years until formula one gearboxes that can shift in a few milliseconds make it out on the market for us lowly public use...

By the way, I read an article on Car and Driver or Road and track or one of those magazines about BMW Z4's sequential tranny, and EVERYONE hated it.... I don't think that stuff is quite ready yet. Perhaps for those who can't drive standard, but those of us who can.... not good enough yet.

Ferrarri makes a good paddleshifter. So does Lamborghini. I haven't seen a Porsche's paddle shifter in action, so I can't comment on it. The only non-paddle sequential manual (truly SMG, not auto-stick) that I've driven was on an MR2. It was OK. Still felt slow, but maybe that was just because I wasn't actually moving the lever myself. I was watching something on the Speed Channel or somewhere that said the WRC Subaru Impreza transmission costs $80,000 all by itself, but that it shifts in .016 seconds. :-) I want one.

The reason people say that autos feel slow is because you have to start from 0 mph with the pedal all the way in, otherwise it will shift to higher early and, later on it might be too late, will refuse to downshift or will downshift not how you want it.