i owned a mk3 and it was a freaking mess. 110k miles, full service history, and oil changed every 5,000 and i had nothing but problems. decent mpg's but thats all.
it was clumsy and sluggish. with the 2.0 i have expected more
the mk4 i test drove the other day have twice the miles and ran a whole lot smoother and sounded a might bit better

but it was a tdi