Observations Comparing my 2018 SQ5 and the 2024 after 2 weeks
First off, I loved my 2018. Even more than my 2014 S4 that I had before that. I kept it stock, only difference when I traded it was that I was running the 21" Michelin AS4s on it, which were still pretty new. While I loved it, it never "felt" as planted as the S4, prob due to the difference in the weight and the center of gravity. It would go around turns pretty good, but the turn in was never as crisp as I wanted. Some folks have said that the new 034 strut brace helped that a lot, due to the flimsy nature of the factory brace pieces.
My wife and I decided to get the new one because we liked the old one so much, not sure what changes they'll make for 2025 model, and everything about the car is familiar to us. But... this is a WAY better driving car than the old one. Not sure how much, if any of that is due to the Pirelli P Zero summers that are on it, but this thing is up there with my old S4 handling-wise. Turn in is super sharp, there is less body roll, and it tracks like crazy. (BTW, I only had 38K miles on the 2018, so it wasn't worn out or anything.) Every day, I can't wait to get in it and go somewhere, anywhere!
The improved tech was one of the reasons we chose to upgrade now. I like the bigger touch screen compared to the old MMI knob. I did like the older driver display arrangement a little better, like with the central round tach, but no biggie. Wireless Carplay is seemless. Strange to not have the Homelink buttons overhead, and when I back out of the garage, I have to do a pull-down on the screen on top of the backup camera in order to be able to close the garage door.
One thing not better is the Audi nav maps. We like the 2D, and everything is grayscale, and the street/road names are very muted and hard to read, even if you are zoomed in. I wish there was a way to make them bolder. Apple maps is a little better and sort of like Google Maps. Overhead view I don't like as much as it seems cluttered to me.
The new sport tips are very nice looking, and they ought to be for what they cost. The only Prestiges I could find in this whole area had them. My wife doesn't like loud cars, so when she is with me, I put it in "Quiet" mode. One observation abour Prestige vs. Premium Plus. We drove a PP with the sport exhaust, and even in quiet and comfort mode on the suspension, the car was much noisier inside than the Prestige. The acoustic glass in the doors definitely makes a noticeable difference.
One thing I could do on my old one was import my MP3 files directly into the car for media play. Have not fould a way to do this yet. I can play from a USB disk, but the manual or the MMI didn't say anything about importing files directly to the car's hard drive. If I'm missing something, let me know.
That's about all I can think of for right now. If folks have done some VCDS coding changes on the later B9.5s, I'd like to know about it, and if the maps can be color/text adjusted.
Cheers!
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Originally Posted by fusion3214
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