**OFF TOPIC WARNING** (well it comes back on topic later if you get that far)
Well this was an interesting day. My visit to HQ today saw me bump into the Fleet Manager. He was ranting about a sales guy who had got a new car the other week and was fired shortly afterwards.
After the delays in getting a test drive your stars finally aligned! It’s funny how things work out sometimes
A BMW 128TI.... I can only comment on the 135i
So with a little arm twisting, he lent it to me for my day's work today. Dog with two tails? Not much!
Strap in kids, here we go! Please read this as my own thoughts, your opinion might be different. I'm a (normally) road based worker, I drive a lot, I've driven lots of really boring cars and not many hardcore ones.
I've done about 150 miles in each of my Mk7.5 GTD and the BMW 128TI today. Good chance for a little review I think!
This was a car with 18's, Tech pack and HK audio.
Weather was somewhere between appalling and biblical unfortunately.
Outside:
Looks pretty good, definitely BMW and not VW. Can't see any angles I don't like. 18's look a bit tiny in the wheel arches but the wheels are pretty neutral - not bad but not great. This one has PS4's on it. Really like the illuminated door handles, neat BMW logo projected onto the floor from the drivers door mirror (but not the passenger door). Dynamic front grill is interesting, with it opening and closing depending on the cooling requirements of the engine (very trick!). Twin black coloured exhausts look good. Lights are LED's all round but no dynamic indicators. Red accents are nice and TI decals look good. Doors shut solidly - front and rear. Boot lid is a bit tinny though. Nice big rear spoiler. Looks purposeful.
The Mk8 also has illuminated door handles and a projection BOTH sides 
I think the 128ti has the best standard wheels between that and the 135i, the 18’s do indeed look a little small though.
Inside:
Feels very premium compared to the Mk8. Nice coloured lighting strips in the doors front and rear. Rear has white footwell lighting. Plastics nice quality, red TI themed stitching all over the place. M sport stripes on the seatbelts.
“The One” interior is masses better feeling than a Mk8, it reminds me of how Golfs were once where even the cheaper lower down plastics are solid feeling and you get the impression if you thumped a panel it’d thump you right back.
Confession: I didn’t notice mine had illuminated rear footwells
The lighting strips in the doors and dash look very classy and are a nice focal point
Getting back in a Golf though, despite feeling retrograde in quality, does have that immediate familiarity and homeliness despite being quite different to a mk7 inside
Driving:
First thing you notice, its very quiet inside. Very quiet. Even without the fake sound turned off. Little road noise, little real engine noise. Even the crappy rain conditions, the spray didn't seem to drum on the wheel arches.
Handling is very good, its really nippy with zero understeer. Lovely and flat round corners. Weather was appalling today so didn't really cane it but I could tell it would be a lot of fun in the dry. The 128TI only has passive dampers, no option for dynamic ones. The ride is hard, I guess thats why its flat handling. Steering feels a little disconnected but what doesn't these days.
I found the ride in the 135i very good, firm yes but absorbed sharp irregularities well despite letting you know what was going on down below
Gearbox is less than perfect in plain drive mode. In stop start traffic it feels very mechanical, grabby and a bit lurchy. At a steady 70mph the thing keeps changing gear, its not terrible but once you've noticed it, it annoys. In sport mode its a bit better, it doesn't seem to hold it at the red line for a lifetime upshifts are more brutal but not neck breaking.
When you put it into sport mode the traction control comes off. If you want it back on, you need to come out of sport mode. That's weird. I managed some wheel spin a few times.
Quick? Probably, if you want to know about quick watch the inevitable drag race videos on youtube. All I will say is its as you would expect.
Exhaust Noise? Not really. When you start it up there is a nice little crackle. That crackle is never seen again, just sounds like any other car after that. I even tried playing in an underground carpark with the windows wound down. Nothing doing.
I went for an early car specifically for the added exhaust noises. Childish but fun! Sadly removed on 2020 models
HK audio is weird. Its both good and bad at the same time. It either has a surround option that seems to throw bits of the audio around the car, a lot of it to the rear or if you turn that off it sounds pretty flat. The surround thing makes all of my music sound very different to how I've ever heard it before. It has a equaliser but the equaliser has no presets, only sliders to play with. Bass isn't earth shattering. By the time you get to about 75% volume the sound seems to fall apart. Sure 75% is too loud, but Dynaudio in a Mk7 is much better. The other funny is that satnav annoucements seem to come from somewhere in the middle of the dash in a tinny sort of way. Odd.
Totally agree with that.
Loads of speakers but bass a bit lacking considering there are supposed to be subs below the front seats
BMW Connected Music (subscription service that you get a year or more for free) is quite good. Lots of choice there.
Wireless android auto was interesting. Worked quite well, except on multiple occassions the audio playback totally fell apart. Just started making weird stuttering noises and I had to turn it off. The wireless charging doesn't keep up with the demands of wireless android auto. If you don't use the charging your phone will be flat in not much time.
The Icon Led Headlights (like Matrix IQ) are nothing short of brilliant. Absolutely incredible.
Not tried the IQ VW lights yet but thought the 7.5 LEDs were a bit brighter than the BMW. The reaction times seemed a bit quicker on the BMW when lights approaching were detected
HUD is superb. Even Waze integrates with it. Barely looked at the dash itself. Maybe was a little too bright at night, I didn't have time to try turning it down, but then maybe its not bright enough for daytime. Possibly needs a day/night mode.
The Idrive interface I found a bit too text heavy and tricky. The main display was cluttered. Sat nav display isn't very clear at all. I expected more. Not sure if this car had the biggest screen you can get. If you could get a bigger one I'd suggest you do.
HUD useful and more so for someone like yourself who spends loads of time on the roads. Less essential for me and I prefer the simplicity of the VW AID when the big central digital speedo inserted into the rev counter option is selected.
Hello BMW! That works really well, all sorts of things you can control with it. It understood what I said pretty much every time even with my accent and using it for navigation or choosing media or radio stations or well, anything, was flawless, speedy and didn't need button pushing at all. Shame her voice seems to come from the same weird tinny speaker as the sat nav.
Reversing assistant - what a hoot! It remembers your last maybe 50m of forward travel, then when you press the button it will drive you backwards up the same way you came in. You do the throttle it steers. Really good. I was nervous but it is dead accurate. BTW the rear view camera gets fouled by bad weather really easily. No idea where it is physically located but most of today its been a blurry mess.
Windscreen wipers on auto seem to have a mind of their own. Annoying.
Had numerous error messages about the forward camera being unavailable. More than just it seemingly giving up, it throws up an annoying message on the central display that you have to click on to make go away. Did it about 5 times today. Could be muck on it, but don't think so. Think it was just seeing scenes it couldn't understand and disabled itself for saftey reasons. Unreliable.
Seats - terrible. Sorry BMW these suck. You sit on them, not in them. Loads of adjustments, it makes no difference. Anyone that wants to sit on the floor, you certainly can. They have adjustable thigh support.
the 135i seats were lovely. I had leather but preferred the alcantara option
Fuel economy for me mainly taking it easy and with a lot of motorway and A roads I managed an average of 30 MPG. Not great. I was averaging mid thirties in the 135i
Handing it back to the Fleet Manager, I had a few glances back and off to the Mk7.5 GTD...
Less premium inside.
AID is much clearer, much better than the BMW. MIB unit is better, but I have navpro.
Car is much noisier on the road but its not as bad as I thought it might be. Can hear road noise and of course the oil burner itself.
Handling definitely not as flat, a little bit of body roll. I'm on 18's with no DCC. However its also a much smoother ride. Much smoother. Still pretty nimble.
Seats.... oh the luxury! I worked out its because you sit in them, the side bolsters on the squab are deeper and extend further forward, it actually grips you (even though the BMW has adjustable width on the vertical bolsters for shoulder width)
Mk7.5 LED headlights seem like they are candle powered after the BMW trick ones.
I'm missing the HUD. Really missing the HUD. I thought I’d miss it but don’t
Stereo (non-dynaudio) seems very front heavy sound, but I get stereo sound which sounds like stereo sound. I don't think surround is much use other than movies.
The Mk7.5 of course has ACC. I missed ACC today. I never use ACC
Manual seems a bit clunky after an auto box for most of the day. But its ok.
Have to say on the on ramp to the motorway the GTD's massive torque didn't seem to be much slower than the more BHP equipped BMW. Interesting.
So the big question.... vs the Mk8 GTI drove the other week.
BMW wins on build and interior quality, external looks and that amazing reversing assistant that I have probably used the one and only time I ever would use it. Agreed.
I never even tried the reverse thing, kept meaning to but didn’t get round to it
Golf wins on gearbox, ride comfort, seats are even better than the Mk7.5, steering feel, instrumentation and seat comfort. It wasn't dark when i drove the Mk8, but expect the lights to be as good as the BMW. Has front and rear swoopy indicators.
My suggestion - get a Golf Mk8 GTI and add some bits to it if you want some of things I talked about the BMW having over a base Mk8. Definitely add the HUD I think.
I couldn't have the BMW because of the seats. Shame. The least technical part of the car and the most important.
Only thing I worry about with the Mk8 seem to be software problems and having keyless entry (the BMW has remote control entry and keyless start).
Does the Mk8 clubsport ride like the 128TI? No idea, but if it does, I'd not buy one. Well, not without DCC.
I wrote this to brain dump the day and help me try and figure out what to do now. Before you ask, I've no idea right now!
Sorry if it was too long and boring!
Glad that job today took me to HQ though....
Very insightful fredgroves and very nicely written too (as ever)
I would never have been interested in the 128ti for some reason. I admire it for what it is but for some reason it doesn’t float my boat at all.
The M135i is superb though and I’d fully expected to keep mine a good while longer and added some nicer looking wheels (although I did like the factory 19’s per se I just fancied something a bit more purposeful).
The Golf feels more like home to me but the 135i is a better car and a great package in my eyes. I do however think VW will pull it back with the 8R and its trick 4wd system that not even the S3 supposedly has.
Many of the features the mk8 GTI has i will hardly use so I’m hoping the haptic buttons won’t irritate me too much but with your type of driving I do hope the UI improves massively with familiarity
