Tranny ?s

Hey guys whats up? First off, Im going to warn you all that I am extremely new to this. I have only taken an interest in driving and performance tuning beyond driving to work in the last week. haha. So heres the deal. I have a 99 chevy cav with an auto tranny. In the long run I would like to make a balanced build with power, performance and not kill my mileage (poor student and all...gas is expensive!!) Everyone tells me that an auto tranny sucks. My question is, should I look into swapping it to man? or maybe get a new auto tranny with the feature where you can bump it back or forward to switch gears at your command but without a clutch. But yet again, since I know absolutely nothing about this stuff yet, perhaps there is tuning I can do to the transmission I have to make wait to a higher rpm to shift, therefor allowing me a quicker start against 5-speeds. Im really at a loss. If there is a way to get the result im looking for without doing major swap work, that would be awesome. Thanks in advance for any and all input, even if it is just stating how hopeless it is...lol peace out guys

1st off, is your car a 2.2 ohv or a 2.4 DOHC???

If it is a 2.2 dont worry with it. That motor is not worth the hassle. If a motor swap is planned for the future then I would look into it at that time.

2nd, is it a 3spd or 4spd ?

If it is the 4spd you can either get an Auto-trans Interceptor or a B&M Shiftplus (basically shift kits). You cannot use these if you have the 3spd.

You could also look into a stall convertor.