I?ve now had my 550 for just over 2 weeks and 1000 miles, including a 700 mile 2 day road trip. I washed the car today, waxed it with One Grand Blitz wax and put some Rejex on the wheels. It?s time for a review and some pictures.

Overall, the car is excellent. As the car is not yet broken-in, I haven?t taken the engine over 4000 rpm. However, I can tell that there is a huge power reserve waiting to be unleashed! Mileage on my trip was 23.7 mpg at an average speed of 72.2 mph. Not too shabby for a car that?s still getting broken in.

I am very pleased with my color choice. Space Gray hides dirt quite well, and the 167 wheels complement the car nicely and are relatively easy to clean. Ordering the Anthracite Headliner was a home run, and is highly recommended.

I installed a Valentine One next to the rear view mirror, and placed the remote in the tray in front of the shifter. It works quite well there, although it does take up most of the compartment.

The electronics on the car work well. The audio choices were well worth the investment. Logic7 is fantastic! Some on here have criticized the sound compared to older E60?s, but I am very happy with it. I am very fussy with my audio systems at home and in my cars, and the E60?s optional system is the best factory system I?ve ever had. I also got SAT, HD Radio and the USB adapter. SAT is a nice feature, and although the audio quality is not quite CD quality, overall it sounds great, and is nice on a long trip. HD radio sound quality is a step above SAT. You can preset the main HD channel, but not HD2 or HD3 broadcast by the main station. You have to get to those via manual tune, an inconvenience, and something I hope that BMW will rectify. The USB/iPod option is well worth the money. I recorded audio files using a less compressed setting (AAC format, 320 kbps bit stream), and the audio quality is outstanding (as good as playing the base CD or wav files). Songs are easily played through iDrive. The only thing lacking is a ?shuffle? mode, which hopefully BMW will add in the future. The iDrive/Bluetooth combination integrates well with my Blackberry, and I was able to have several phone conferences during my road trip.

The Sport Automatic transmission is quite slick. I have not used it extensively as I am still in break-in mode, but it is lightning quick on gear changes, and the thumb shifters are quite convenient. The transmission is a big upgrade over the older Steptronic version. The car handles extremely well, and rides on rails around corners with virtually no body lean. I haven?t pushed the car yet, and am looking forward to the end of the beak-in period so I can let it loose.

Compared to my beloved 2001 540i, my new 550 is smoother, quieter, more comfortable, and handles better. If you have an E39 and are on the fence about an E60, go for it! The 550 is a much more refined car, and I love it!

Lou

 

Glad you're enjoying your car so far -- just wait until you hit the break-in point...

You'll be blown away!!

(BTW, there is a "shuffle" mode on for your audio files -- it's called "random"...)

 

very nice. continue enjoying it

 

And don't forget about the 'much more powerful' part.

Your 550i looks stunning ... great set-up.

You make an appropriate comparison to your old 540. When I first got my 550i, I was amazed at how far BMW had advanced the Ultimate Driving Machine. I had previously moved from a 1995 540i into a 2001 740i, and while there was some improvement over the prior generation, it was marginal. But jumping from a 2001 to 2006 machine was literally worlds apart.

You've got 1,000 miles on it? It's broken in ... get on it.

 

Mmmmm, 1200 miles.

 

Yes, it is time to get on it. I just picked up my 2007 550 new a few weeks ago (first BMW) and jumped on it 2 or 3 times under 1,000 miles for a real short burst. You are good to go. Probably not a good idea to push it to the limit, but I doubt these things need babying. To put it in perspective, I put an aftermarket supercharger on my cobra mustang and pushed it to 600 horsepower at 500 miles on the clock and then ran it. No problems ever and my friends with high horsepower cars have done the same thing. If those cars can take, I am pretty sure a machine like a new BMW can handle it no problem. By the way, I didn't know what I was missing until I bought this thing. I can't believe I didn't see the light sooner. Refinement and quality of the driving experience is amazing. Glad to be a BMW owner - great forum here too guys.

Mark

 

Congrats on the new ride.... Are the RIMS Factory?

 

I will check on the random option. Thanks Rudy.

BMW recommends 1200 miles, then gradually increase speed (when do you hit light speed? ). I have 200 miles left to go for "proper" break-in. Patience, Grasshopper.

jay545i, the wheels are OEM Style 167's.

Lou

 

One note about the random function -- it seems as if the "randomness" is only that once. In other words, on my 80GB hard drive full of songs, if I play them using the random function, no matter how many times I select it or start and stop the car, it always plays the songs in the same random order. It never "reshuffles" them. How hard could it be to give us a better random feature? (I know, if I had an iPod it would probably work better...)

 

Great report. Thank you for sharing. Your car look stunning.

Best