If I can respectfully say, opinions from ignorant tirerack customers does nothing for me. There is so much misinformation on the net, with people espousing opinions and stating them as facts.
I have had the stock summer RFT now for 4 1/2 years, minus two winters, and they are phenomenal in the wet or dry (summer). I push my cars hard and the E60 with the sport package (both a 545 and a 535 Dinan) are hard to fishtail even at ridiculous speeds. I have had numerous sports cars trying to follow me around a clover leaf, loss it, and end up in the weeds. I was racing a WRX STI through a series of esses, he stayed with me but was losing distance. When we hit the straight away we both pulled over and he said that while he was able to keep up, he said that he was all over the road while I was solidly in my lane the whole time.
Anyone that says the E60's don't defy physics (creative license here), should go take driving lessons.

 

Your opinion is as solid as the handling set up of most BMWs .

I took a 2009 M5 for a spin this afternoon - it was the GM's personal car and since it had a few miles on it he told me to nail it a couple of times. Granted it was warm and dry but this thing was glued to the road even when I cranked the wheel in a hard left and quick right turn and simultaneously floored it. There was a lot of noise and tire smoke, no doubt a few thousand miles of rubber were left on the asphalt ... but stability systems kept it straight and pointed exactly where I steered it.

IMHO it would take reckless driving behavior to get this car in trouble. That being the case, I can only surmise with a "regular" V-8 e60 it was poor driving or equipment that caused the driving hysteria reported in this post.

This is something you can relate to Jonathan ... many PC problems are caused by a malfunction between the chair and the keyboard ... probably something similar here

 

That's what's affectionately known [in geek circles] as "PEBCAK"...

 

That's a shame - if you keep RFT's on your car you're really selling it short. Good tires really transform the E60, and their presence really undermines any claim that the car is truly performance oriented. I have a car right now that handles better than the E60, and my E60's had both RFT and non-RFT tires, so I am very familiar with the differences and what can be achieved with a better setup. The RFT's are, in performance terms, mediocre at best compared to say a PS2 or an F1 GS-D3 - both of which I have owned. You'd do very well to try a better tire - in your case, with a Dinan upgrade, you're selling your car massively short.

As for tirerack surveys, they're about the best we can reasonably get. There are few if any extensive double blind tests performed on tires... The tirerack data is more likely than not to be reasonably representative as it comes from so many sources. Some will indeed be ignorant, some will not - but with so much data, the extremes will exert much less influence and broad consensus will emerge. The tire rack surveys place the PS2 as their top tire, with the GS-D3 a very close second. Few would dispute the validity of these positions- the data can't be all bad ;-)

The M5, of course, does not come with RFT's, and nor does the 550i M-Sport - both sportier than the 545/535 you have driven (as the 535/545 have standard sport suspension). If there were any performance gains from an RFT, they would be fitted to the M5. As is stands, they are not.

 

As for your first part, I am speculating too as I have not done any back to back testing between the RFT's and non. I didnt say my tires were the best out of everything available, just said that they handled beyond my expectations. To say that because the M's don't have RFT's so they are not as good is a leap of faith too. It could just as easily be that the 19" tires don't have a sufficiently tall sidewall to make as a RFT or maybe the M's or 550 Sport are not made in enough numbers to warrant making special RFT for them
I did post a link to the rigorous road & track article in this thread that tested the Pirelli Nero RFT and Nero nonRFT and they both tested the same.

 

D'oh!!

I read too fast through your post and the inline quotes.. I thought you were saying that summer tires are no different than regular tires.

Apologies...

 

Or "PICNIC"

 

Whatever you do get rid of the runflats.

 

This thread has failed to answer the OP's question (other than temperature or driver issues) and turned into to a RF vs non-RF debate. The OP does not have RF tires and they should not be considered part of his problem/issue...

 

I believe we gave him all possible explanations:

1. He cannot drive. Means he just does not know what to expect from a RWD car when going around a corner.
2. Cold temperatures that require special attention with HP summer tires, especially in wet
3. Rear tires may be bold
4. He hit a mid-corner bump that RFT tires do not handle well (kind of variation of paragraph 1.)
5. He turned off DSC and is not able to handle a powerful car w/out DSC (another variation of paragraph 1.)

What more a reasonable person can ask for.