I was lucky enough to be the tech chosen at the dealer to go to the A8 launch event out in Dana Point CA, held at the 5-star St. Regis Monarch Beach resort (wow, what a place!). Anyways, the new A8 is sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet! The Audi engineers have thought of everything and gone over every detail hundreds of times until it was all just right. They did a beautiful job. There were 58 pre-production cars there, 36 of them for driving. The fit and finish is awesome, the styling is great, the 4.2L has more than adequate power, the new 8-speed gearbox is probably the best transmission I've ever experienced. You literally cannot feel it shift. It seems like the car has a CVT trans. All the controls are EXACTLY where they should be, the feel of them is perfect, and the new MMI is excellent and perfectly placed in front of the shifter, which is countoured to be a wrist rest when using the MMI. I could go on for days about this car (and the St Regis).

Anyways, you all have to go see one of these cars soon as they're in the showrooms. Each dealer is getting at least one for demo or loaner use same as any new model launch.

Oh yeah, they also had "the competition" there, BMW-7 series and Mercedes S-Class (both AWD versions). Have to say, the Audi tops the BMW and as for the Mercedes, not even close. We drove the cars to El Toro where they had autocross courses set up. We were told to drive the cars hard and to the limits. To be honest, I was unimpressed with both the BMW and Mercedes. The A8 is at least twice the car in handling, braking, quality of materials, fit and finish, and everything else. It was only a couple mph slower from standing start to the braking area (BMW 92 mph, Audi 89 mph). The S-Class is a chinsy POS if you really look close IMO. I think Audi has come up with a winning flagship for the brand and should have no problem taking the #1 spot in the luxury car market by 2015 like they want to.

 

Reply to the SPAM that was removed, deleted. (Can't figure out how to just delete my post!)

 

We have a demo short wheelbase at the dealership in eulong gray with black interior. i really dig the interior layout right down to the led lighted roof and leg lines which, incidentally, can be switched to one of 3 colors. it looks really tough when the adaptive air suspension is lowered. the mmi is incredibly intuitive. bonus for streaming music via bluetooth and video sd uploads. the massaging seats are no joke. it's so sick in that thing. the only thing i'm not sure about is the nose. it seems to capture one thing i don't like from the a6 and another from the a4. but that's probably just a personal thing. overall, the car is hot, hot, hot. and did i mention it drives great, much better than s-class and well better than a 7-series. You don't feel like you're in a boat, and the power is all over as opposed to being concentrated towards the top end. There are far worse things in the world than an a8, but at this amount, few things come to mind that are better.