I had to drop the tranny in my 1993 944.

Yes, get the car up as high as possible. I remember jacking the front, the back, then the front and back again. The car looked dangerously high, odd, standing on four skinny legs. Use a back up to the jack stands in case the cheap jack casting breaks. I used a 3.5 ton jack in the front and a fat log with some 4x4s stacked on top in the back.

I think I left the dip stick tube in place but cannot remember for sure.

Used a cheap tranny jack to get it down but my son and I had to wrestle the tranny, 300 lbs (+,-) off the jack before it could clear the bottom of the car.

Don't forget to remove the kick down cable at the throttle bale on the manifold.

Two man job makes it three or four times easier. I wish I had a 16mm(?) 1/2" drive universal socket, couldn't find one on short notice and ended up using a standard craftsman universal drive.

Before you do anything, get the engine in TDC if you are planning to remove the tone ring/fly wheel for a rear seal change, which you should do. When the tranny is out, mark the tone ring for TDC.

The exhaust did not get in the way of the tranny removal.

Use service removable locktite at the starter mounting bolts, tone ring bolts and add it to the rear seal plate bolts.

Tom