Prices went up on Boxster overnight....

If you haven't ordered your new 981 yet, some news.

The MSRP has gone up about $1,200 and Platinum Silver is gone, replaced with
Rhodium Silver Metallic. It's a bit grayer, without the underlying gold hue. For my
money, it's less interesting.

Hope you have your order in already, Guether.

"A mile of highway will take you one mile. A mile of runway will take you anywhere."

Here we have such a well-engineered series of cars, yet the web site that presents them to the world is often inconsistent, internally contradictory, difficult to navigate, and sometimes downright misinformative. Why is it that until one gets to the specific model's configurator, where one begins the selection of color, wheels, etc, the old price is still shown? When the 981 Cayman was added, they had some of the specs for the Boxster instead that were obviously wrong, such as power and weight. Does it really take weeks to straighten this out, and who signed off on this anyway?
Examine the GT3's microsite: it's a navigational nightmare and when one looks at technical features, there are effectively generic, swoopy videos with no real presentation or demonstration of the feature.
Examine the so-called online owner's manuals, which aren't specific to the model you select.
Et cetera.
I might make errors of content and style here, but posting on an internet forum is not my Profession.

I'm not sure where the break down is occurring. If the info given to the designers is incorrect or if the designers aren't reading it correctly. Even in printed materials, we've found incorrect information. Maybe just a push to get the info out there quickly, and not enough time spent double checking for errors. That shouldn't be happening since it could be the first impression a potential client is getting of the company.

Guenter
2014 Boxster S
GT Silver, 6 Speed Manual, Bi-Xenons, Sports Suspension (lowers car 20mm), Porsche Sports Exhaust, Porsche Torque Vectoring, Auto Climate control, heated and vented seats, 20" Carrera S Wheels, Pedro's TechNoWind, Sport Design steering wheel, Roll bars in GT Silver
[www.cyberdesignconcepts.com]

One can go back decades of car literature and see quaint errors of translation, but numbers are numbers, and a company like Porsche ought to be a paragon of getting that stuff right. (Hey, The Right Stuff!) Some of the problem can be with so-called "right-sizing" where companies pare back on all but what they deem to be essential. Look at the text crawls and bugs on TV news stations: misspellings are rampant. Either the level of literacy has gone down or there's nobody being paid to proofread. Or both.

the levl of literacy hs gn doun? Cnt undr stand why. U shul of chekd mor karfully.

It's only going to get worse, I'm afraid.

Guenter
2014 Boxster S
GT Silver, 6 Speed Manual, Bi-Xenons, Sports Suspension (lowers car 20mm), Porsche Sports Exhaust, Porsche Torque Vectoring, Auto Climate control, heated and vented seats, 20" Carrera S Wheels, Pedro's TechNoWind, Sport Design steering wheel, Roll bars in GT Silver
[www.cyberdesignconcepts.com]

Answer: I don't know and I don't care.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/07/2013 01:18PM by Laz. (view changes)

not enough time spent double checking for errors. That shouldn't be happening since it could be the first impression a potential client is getting of the company.

You're so right - a potential customer might get the impression their engines are sold before being adequately tested for reliability !!!

You're way ahead of me on this one Gary.

I never really cared for the Platinum silver. It looks dull to me. This Rhodium Silver looks like it would look good on a tank. However, you have to see it in person first as it's pretty hard to get the colours right on the web. The Platinum Grey interior is much lighter than it is on the website for instance.

Lots of time for me, as long as they keep offering a manual. Just barely got the CURVEN8R broken in.

I really come to appreciate the profundity of the color combination Agate Grey Metallic (even over Seal Grey!) with Yachting Blue interior and Blue top. Now being aware of the occasional harsh reflection the center console trim has, I would've gotten the Center console trim in leather, had it been available. The vent slat option doesn't matter, as the slots themselves are black. It's the surround trim up there that ought to have a leather option.

Have you tried polarized sunglasses?

I agree that I don't like light colours on the dash. I don't like anything that interferes with clear vision of what's ahead (or anywhere around) you when driving.

I guess that's why they have all the electronic gismos that check if you're in the lane, the distance of the car in front or if someone steps out in front of you. The electronic gismos will look after it and apply the brakes if necessary. The driver doesn't really need ot know what's going on around him/her.

Some years ago I noticed that some, if not all the 986's display alpha-numerics seemed much dimmer than the overall lessening of light transmission. A simple experiment, holding polarized glasses a few inches away from my eyes and rotating them showed the effect. I think most lenses are oriented at 45º to give an averaging effect on ambient natural light, but it's too much for the instrument readouts to remain at their perceived brightest. I supposed a polarized "bifocal" would work for 986s and 7s, but probably would be ineffective for the 981's interior reflection issues, especially that of the center console.
Avoiding interior color windshield reflections is one reason I went with darker, but not black, interiors.
I suppose I could apply some cheesey appliqué or matte paint to the offending areas, but, again, that would just look cheesey.
In the grand scheme of things, I wish all of life's problems were no worse than being a Porsche owner dealing with the occasional offensive reflection!

I'm thinking of doing a polarizing film over the tachometer face to reduce the glare from the silver background ; don't know for sure how much it will improve things but as it is right now in bright sunlight I have a problem reading it.

The silver background doesn't bother me, and the tach's legibility seems not much different from the other instruments in most lighting situations. That said, why Porsche picked that particular treatment to be one of the visual differentiators from the base model is beyond me. Twin exhaust tips I can understand, and are of no real ergonomic or performance consequence anyway. If your application works, I'd like to give it a whirl, and with the right material and workmanship, ought not to look cheesey at all.

[www.photodon.com]

Related to what they put on computer screens to eleiminate glarte.

"A mile of highway will take you one mile. A mile of runway will take you anywhere."

My thought is it's the combination of the white on silver background--not enough contrast--and normal glare that these instrument's clear plastic covers provide in sunlight. With white on black, there is enough contrast to over come the glare; with white on silver there just isn't enough contrast to deal with the glare--at least that's the theory; we'll see if it has any impact.

If white on black was too staid for the interior designers on the S, they could have stayed with black on white on the 987S-- I think that works even better for clarity in sunlight.

He didn't say a word to me. I had previously asked about increased prices and he said the Carrera was going up but not the Boxster. I was planning on ordering this week.

Quote
Laz
n/t

Seems that way, doesn't it. You would hope that before the website makes any pricing changes, that the dealerships are all notified of the new price schedule so they don't look like idiots in front of a customer.

Interesting- I just purchased a '13 S from dealer stock on Saturday- no mention was made of the price increase. Would have expected them to raise it as a selling point in the dealer's favor during price negotiation (list price on the instock unit was the pre-increase value).

Base price: $50,400
Price for Equipment: $0
Destination Charge: $950
Total Price: $51,350 before options, of course....

S basic price: $62,100
Price for Equipment: $0
Destination Charge: $950
Total Price: $63,050 before options....

"A mile of highway will take you one mile. A mile of runway will take you anywhere."