Mark,

Just the other day a colleague and I were talking "Volvo" (he owns a '95 V70 turbo) and we both surprised each other as we feel our next car may very well be a BMW. Don't get me wrong, I live and breath Volvo and am very involved with the CVC (Canadian Volvo Club). But while keeping both the 240 and 850, I am considering a BMW for my wife. This is simply a poor excuse to purchase what IMHO is what a true performance car should be: RWD. To disregard things like HP and torque or simply power for a minute, a true performace vehicle begins with RWD and I stand by that in a big way. FWIW, I have a problem with manufacturers continuing to deliver increased HP while at the same time sticking with the FWD platform. AWD is certainly a compromise, but I think BMW and other RWD designs have over all of us the advantage of RWD handling without annomolies like "torque steer" typically found on powerfull FWD designs like SAAB. To quote your previous comment...I think we are comparing apples to oranges.