Booked some test drives at the weekend in the above vehicles all similar list prices with the VW being the cheapest and the BMW the most expensive (although it looked as though the BMW would be discounted). There was a problem with the Q7 test drive which I'll mention later. They were all automatic.

First Impressions:

BMW - Big but did not seem that big, nicely laid out cabin but not many toys, seat comfortable and nicely adjustable.

VW - The smallest of the three, seat comfortable in the front - plenty of kit included (including spare wheel)

Audi - as it was the last car to be test drive it didn't seem as big as I though it might - the cabin is large but the boot was huge (and 7 seats). Not much kit included.

Road test.

BMW - 3.0l diesel engine and gearbox were smooth as silk and handled well and felt like a much smaller car, There was a bit of roll in the corners but the seats (in both the front and back) held the passengers well. The ride although firm was so firm you could feel every bump in the road.

VW - V6 3.0l diesel engine was quiet but power delivery seemed to be a bit jerky and not nice, this gave rise to a jerky ride and the ride was a bit jiggly and it wasn't a pleasant experience in the back.

Audi - I'd love to tell you what this one was like but we had booked an appointment at 4pm and on arrival was told the Salesman was "busy" and would be with us shortly. We looked at the Showroom Q7 (hence the first impressions) and then sat down with a cup of coffee. After 40 minutes waiting and no explanation (or contact) we had had enough and left.

In conclusion the VW was the best equipped as standard (Sat Nav, DAB etc) but it didn't feel like a £38k car - in fact my wife said it reminded her of a Touran. Salesman was a bit pushy and a little bit condescending but it seems he'd was trying to get a sale that afternoon although we had mentioned we were looking at other cars. We were disappointed with this car as we thought it was going to better than it was.

The Q7 was huge inside but we didn't get to drive it - uninterested Dealers - well at least this one was - I don't think I'll be buying one from there.

The BMW drove nicely , , the shortcomings of the equipment weren't that expensive to rectify (£1500) and it felt like it was worth the money, although some of the plastics especially in the boot were a bit hard and scratchy, the salesman was best in approach and helpfulness.

We almost bought the BMW but the common sense gene kicked in and we wondered whether we could really afford to run these, even though both the BMW and VW had fixed price services (BMW £400 for 5 years and VW £499 for 3 years) the RFL, other diesel costs and insurance would have been a significant increase. I also get the feeling that over the next few years the efficiency of this type of vehicle is going to increase dramatically.

Audi dealers are up their own backsides. When we went round looking for a car for the mother in law she wanted to test an A3, a 118 and a Golf. BMW just gave her the keys and told her to have a good drive, VW was an accompanied test drive and Audi couldn't be bothered to even acknowledge us in the showroom.

She ended up with the Golf but BMW gave the best service with no hard sell etc.

I have never understood snpbby dealers as you just can't judge by appearances. When I was at school a friend of my dad's who runs a skip company (and is a multi millionaire) went into a Mercedes dealer in his work jumper, jeans and cockney accent and was given the cold shoulder by a stupid and condescending young oik of a salesman. The next day he went to the same dealer with £74K in cash and ordered a 500SL for his wife (he had a big Landcruiser thing: one with the 4.2 Diesel). I would have gone elsewhere but he wanted to make a point.

Anyway to your review: interesting choice you made. That VW V6 seems a beefy engine and the Tourag seems like a lovely car (the Q7 is too big: like threading the Lucitania down the road) but my only concern with that car would be higher depreciation than the BMW. My choice would be a smaller X3 with the six pot Diesel.

Anyway nice review

Edited 15 May, 201214 yr by Matt Bodycombe

I had a Q7 3.0 TDi for a few days once and it was very impressive. Like you say there is masses of room inside and the boot was big, until you put the 3rd row of seats up! Power is immense and the auto box handled things very well - don't ask about consumption though!

All these cars are massive and that was my problem - when we went shopping in it over the weekend, I had to park out the way taking up 2 spaces. Yes it would fit in a space but then you couldn't open the rear doors properly to get the kids out.

I have never understood snpbby dealers as you just can't judge by appearances. When I was at school a friend of my dad's who runs a skip company (and is a multi millionaire) went into a Mercedes dealer in his work jumper, jeans and cockney accent and was given the cold shoulder by a stupid and condescending young oik of a salesman. The next day he went to the same dealer with £74K in cash and ordered a 500SL for his wife (he had a big Landcruiser thing: one with the 4.2 Diesel). I would have gone elsewhere but he wanted to make a point.

Anyway to your review: interesting choice you made. That VW V6 seems a beefy engine and the Tourag seems like a lovely car (the Q7 is too big: like threading the Lucitania down the road) but my only concern with that car would be higher depreciation than the BMW. My choice would be a smaller X3 with the six pot Diesel.

Anyway nice review

its funny how people are isn't it? I tend to be in jeans and a sarcastic (IT crowd type) or metal t-shirt... (I wouldnt dress differently if I was a millionaire) went into a pergeot garage once asking for a 106 GTI for a drivivng school car, and they didn't take me seriously..

went into an aston martin garge, (because they had a saxo VTS on the forecourt) no-one was around, so was looking at the astons... a nice man came over and sincerly asked me if I'd like a test drive (of one of the astons!) I bought the VTS, went to the pergeot garage in it and explained how their arrogance cost them over £10k ...

I'm sorry to say that the common sense gene didn't work well enough and we have ordered a space grey X5 30 M Sport. I think we got quite a good discount and will pick it up in a couple of weeks (it wasn't a factory order!) Have to see if it's as good as the Octavia though - the mpg certainly won't be. I'll stick it on fuelly to track it's mpg.

Just an update on the Audi as well - the salesman rang the following Tuesday to apologise and offered to bring the car around tools house for a test drive. Unfortunately the damage had been done on the Saturday!

The thread title says you tested the X5 SE which you found to have very firm suspension and then you went and ordered the (stiffer still) M sport model? lol

Either way a great car I'm sure!

Enjoy

I passed a brand new Q7 yesterday on the motorway - even though it was new, it looked so dated?

In fact I think most of Audi's range is looking dated.

The SE we tested had the Dynamic pack on (sports suspension etc) and we retested again before we had made our final decision. The discounts and finance were much better on a new one than on a nearly new one and it comes with the extras of 7 seats, 20" alloys, Media Pack, folding mirrors and the 5 year servicing package.

In fact I think most of Audi's range is looking dated.

They all look the same - I can't tell the difference between an A4 and an A6 anymore.

The thread title says you tested the X5 SE which you found to have very firm suspension and then you went and ordered the (stiffer still) M sport model? lol

Either way a great car I'm sure!

Enjoy

Out of the 3 cars tested id have the X5 i think. Definately not an MSport though, never again and not with big bling wheels. It really bothers me when following X5's that they have so much camber on the rear wheels. They must chew through their tyres. The big wide as hell bling wheels look terrible IMO. The basic ones look more fitting for a 4x4 type vehicle. Other than the suspension and bling wheels i think the BMW would return better MPg than the VW and certainly the AUDI. Every BMW ive had seems to fair better than all other cars ive had in terms of economy. This is relative however so be prepared for high 20's or low 30's at best i would guess. Very nice car though, our client at my current site has one and i have been in it with him a few times, lovely place to spend time but not sure i could stomach replacement tyre costs.

The mpg is in my signature. This is mostly short local journeys - got 34mpg on a trip to Northumberland fully loaded with roofbox which I didn't think was bad even on the wide blingy tyres and 38mpg on a day trip to Wales.

The big 20" (43kg each!) are in the garage at the moment and the 19" winter wheels and tyres are on. We are very happy with it. It's comfortable and the economy better than we expected compared with the the car it replaced (Audi A6 Avant TDie which averaged about 40mpg) and we can fit in the Dogs, luggage and all the daughter's stuff.

Just a final update to this as we part exchanged the X5 away a couple of weeks ago.  We were very please with the car for the 3 years we owned it - cost us nothing extra  for servicing, tyres or other maintenance for the 3 years. It was reliable (but then only had 13500 miles on the clock), reasonably comfortable  and I suppose for it's size fuel efficient (low 30 mpg).   We got used to the harder ride (fine on motorways - not so good on some of Cheshire's pot holed back roads)  which was mitigated in the winter with 19" winter wheel/tyres with a higher profile. The insurance was again reasonably cheap (last year <£500).  We had several holidays in the UK and it had plenty of room (with roofbox) for 4 adults and two dogs.  The addition of the roofbox didn't seem to affect the mpg at all. 

 

It did have a couple of problems - the 20" wheel's lacquer started to peel (even not being used in the winter - but seems a common problem and were supposed to be replaced under warranty -but were on back order) and the tailgate lights let in moisture (also replaced under warranty). Local garage's service was excellent so much so that the new vehicle is a new X5 3.0d SE - mini review below:-  

 

It is the newer model that was introduced in 2013 and the difference between the cars is isn't that great but it has been improved in almost every way. The SE is slightly lower trim grade than the M Sport and loses some of the styling features (body kit and 20" offset wheels), it also doesn't get the sports suspension which makes for a much comfortable ride especially on Cheshire's well kept back roads. It does mean that it does have a bit more body roll in the corners - but at least I get to keep my fillings. (Although the new M sport gets adaptive suspension as standard)

 

The interior is spacious allowing three adults to sit comfortably across the back seats (or one long limbed 11 year old) and two optional second row seats that can be folded up in the boot. These seats are more suited to smaller people but I could travel there reasonably comfortably on short journeys. The main reason for having the 7 seat version is that it enables the rear seats to be moved backwards and forwards so we can fit the dog crate. (This can also be done by having the rear seat comfort option but the price difference and that the 7 seat retains more of it's value made that option a better choice). The rear seats now are 40/20/40 split rather than 60/40 and increases the flexibility of the load space - it is also slightly bigger than the previous model - we can have the dog crate and one of the second row seats up as well.  A power tail gate is also now standard.

 

The ICE which uses the iDrive system has been updated as well with a larger LCD screen and has a USB, 3.5mm aux and a DVD slot. The Sat Nav is now standard - the iDrive controller allows input of numbers and letters by drawing on the top of the controller with your finger. Music can be either played directly from the USB or downloaded to an internal HD  from either the USB drive or DVD. It supports Apple, Windows and MP3 formats.

 

The new 3.0 diesel engine has lower co2 emissions (156g),  more power 258hp , more torque (560Nm) , better mpg (47mpg - I find this hard to believe) and a faster 0-62 (6.8s) - it does have the disadvantage that it uses Adblue.(but free top ups with the included 5 year service plan). So far on 250miles or so it has return an average of just under 34mpg.

 

The other added new standard equipment is the lane departure warning system and the low speed collision avoidance system. 

 

With the all the added equipment - the only piece of cost cutting seems to be the replacement of the aluminium dashboard trim with what appears to be silver coloured plastic (Silver Oxide) -  it doesn't look too bad - and we did find that the real aluminium trim in the old model scratched extremely easily and consequently looked good new but not after a few weeks use. 

 

There was no increase in insurance premium in switching models.

 

It also has a the now obligatory - Eco, comfort and Sport modes - but compared to my Oct 3 1.6tdi they appear to do something - not quite sure yet what - but after a brief play they seem different.

We had very few options added - 7 seats, and Memory Front seats. and received a small discount.

 

We did again look at other models but they were either two small (Kia, Hyundai, Mitsubushi, VW, BMW 5 Touring Merc GLE ), too expensive (Merc GL, Range Rover Sport)  or Audi (see above!)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Great review.

 

13,500 miles in 3 years or 4,500 miles per year is very low mileage. Is the X5 a second car?

Great review.

 

Is the X5 a second car?

 

 

Yes it is - the Octavia does 18k a year.

 

We also improved the X5 by having a Briskoda sticker in the Front window.  I wonder if they removed it?

I don't want to pry but I can only imagine the depreciation on a brand new car of this class / price is likely to be fairly substantial.

 

Given the low mileage and tendency to change after three years did you consider a PCP or a lease?

 

Granted I imagine the deposit and monthly payments are going to be hefty but given some of the incentives out there now I wonder if you could get yourself into something like a Range Rover for the same overall 3-year cost on a 'run it for three years and hand it back' type scenario?

 

 

 a PCP 

 

 

 

  -  Deposit not huge and although the monthly payments are more than the Octavia - I have seen more quoted for lesser vehicles.   One of the main reasons for getting another BMW has been the dealership, it's local and 10 minute drive away - they have been helpful at every turn and we also seem to to get a very good discount on accessories. 

That's fair enough, it was just when I read your post saying that you'd gone for another X5 and how that was in part down to the Range Rover being too expensive I suddenly had "Range Rover vs. BMW X5" in my head and (without driving either by the way) thought I'd love to make the sums on the latest Range Rover work 

That's fair enough, it was just when I read your post saying that you'd gone for another X5 and how that was in part down to the Range Rover being too expensive I suddenly had "Range Rover vs. BMW X5" in my head and (without driving either by the way) thought I'd love to make the sums on the latest Range Rover work 

 

The Range Rover  (Sport or otherwise)  is  considerable more expensive >£12k .

Ah, that rules that out then!