PUZZ1

I think the choice is down to E320 4Matic vs. E500. What would you do for similar dollars??

HELL ONA HARLEY

Geewhiz..... would you just buy something already.....
Don't worry what everyone here wants you to get, buy what YOU want....... G.L with what ever you decide to get.

FIXEDupW209

well decide whats more important to you. Is having all wheel drive important? do you live in a climate where you will be driving in the snow a lot? if yeah they i would chose the 4matic otherwise i see no reason for it. good luck and yeah this and color choices are something you should choose, good luck

DavidNJ

E500, more fun.

E320 4Matic, more practical. That E320 is more show than go.

Connecticut, only car? You need snow tires either way. I would go with the...actual either will work. Maybe 2-3 days a year the 4Matic would be better.

The rest of the year the E500 has the edge. Fuel mileage won't be great either way. the E500 may have 1.5-2.0 sec edge 0-60. That's huge.

wem

Go for the 4matic. You'll be happy you did on the rainy and snowy days on the Merritt Pkwy. There is a definite difference in handling with all wheel drive. I enjoy driving fast. The 500 is faster, but 320 is no slouch. With the airmatic suspension, it handles just as well as my Audi TT Quattro. I only kept my rear wheel drive E320 for 9 months before trading it in for an E320 4matic last week.

DavidNJ

No offense, wem, but the Audi TT Quattro is not a handling benchmark.

The 4Matic handles well, however I don't think I would necessarily say better than the RWD. Can you even recall a magazine test of a 4Matic? All the tests I know of MB provided an RWD.

bmms8

i believe they use rwd, because all of the other cars are rwd, and awd gives you less whp, meaning a slower car, from a roll. if you dont care for power, and im sure you dont need power in the snow, or rain, go for the 4matic, i think it will suit you a lot better in your weather conditions, but like others said, its up to you. GL

zzoorrkk

My dad has an E320, and I have an E500. I love the extra power of the V8. It handles well in the dry and rain. I have driven it in snow and I must say it is tricky to drive with the performance tires on my E. Then again, there really is not too much snow where I live.

RAD

I say neither choice "a" (E320 4MATIC) nor choice "b" (E500)...go for choice "c", the E500 4MATIC!

PUZZ1

I should have said that our second car is an Audi allroad quattro. I've never had this much difficulty in making a decision.

The E320 4Matic is Platinum Blue/Stone and the E500 is Capri/Stone. The 320 is equpped with Parktronic, Appearance, Premium. The 500 is equipped with just Premium. Very similar pricing.

DavidNJ

Now that is any easy decision. Get the E500.

You really don't need the 4Matic, and will get the 7 speed auto, 4-place climate control, plus all the other stuff on the E500.

The bigger question is your opinion of Capri Blue. If you are leasing, resale isn't an issue, and Capri is the highest chroma color on an E-class (the other would be Bordeaux Red; Midnight Blue is a higher chroma than most however it is also very dark.)

Does the E500 have xenon lights???

PUZZ1

No xenons on the 500 unfortunately. The 320 has them as part of the appearance, however, I'm not crazy about the black wood trim and the blue tinted glass.

What do you mean by "chroma" color??

DavidNJ

Colors have three properties, best observed on an HSB (Hue-Saturation-Brightness) scale.

if their was zero saturation (then hue doesn't matter either), brightness would range from white to black with grey in between.

If there is a color, the color itself is on the 360 degree hue scale, and the intensity of the color is on the saturation. Colors we think of as bright (e.g., yellow) have a high brightness. Colors that are darker (blue), have a lower brightness.

MB, for the most part, is painting E-classes with various shades of grey. Platinum Blue, for example, had very little blue. Pewter has some blue. Midnight Blue has lots of blue, but is much darker than the peak for the color.

The Red, Capri Blue, Desert Silver are really the only US E-class colors that, well, have a lot of color. Most of the rest, and even these, are all pretty dark and subdued.

Any color on an HSB scale can be converted to its RGB or CMYK equivalent. However those scales tell you the about of pigment to use to create the color, not what the color itself is.

moa4r

since u laid out the cars like that w/the options and colors, I'd say go for the 500; honestly, you can't go wrong with either car...
personally, I LOVE the dark wood and white gauges of the sport package, but I'd still go for the 500 just because of the engine; plus, your getting full leather and 4-zone climate control, which are small things, but still; good luck man;

DavidNJ

Actually, the black wood with the stone is not the best combo. Stone makes the brown wood look great. The black works best with ash (grey), IMHO and the color MB used in the brochure. It is also ok with Charcoal (which is probably the most common selection).

So I would have to agree with the E500.

The stone probably goes better with the capri blue than platinum blue anyway. And the reason the E320 is still there is at least partially due to the color combo (with an ash or charcoal interior it would have been sold long ago).