well i own a 98 v 70r and am quite happy its got 98k miles on it and not much has gone wrong ...ok ..well lets just say it has not left me stranded i havent had any problems with the awd system cause i do the right maitanace like tires ....rotation...lube etc ...and remember I'm a guy that actually owns one .....so your getting info 1st hand ...but most of all its not an awd system you can not abuse ...like spining your tires on snow or dirt for fun ...thats what kills the awd ...i live in norther california and it only snows when I'm in the mountains during winter but my work some times requrires me to drive in some scary situations like white out on windy mountain roads ....thats why i own a volvo instead of a suv .(they like to flip over like dead cockroaches ) .. before buying i considered other options like the t5 ,glt ,cross country ...but owning a real R car got me to had over the money ...remember its an r not a glt or t5 or the cc its an r car man and if i had to do it again i would buy the r awd again well if they had the 5speed ??? its got the best brakes out of all the v70's acording to road and track