analogman

Completely agree with you. Tonight I was perusing reviews and stories about the 370Z on line, that have been posted within the past couple of years. Almost all of them gripe about how the car is 'outdated', and desperately needs 'updating'.

I would bet most of the people making those comments have never actually driven a 370Z. So many armchair experts on the internet.

What's 'outdated' about the car?

Styling: to my (admittedly old school) eyes, it's drop-dead gorgeous. Looks like a show car. Doesn't matter that it's 10 years old. It's still beautiful, and it just shows how well the design has aged.

Layout: torquey, naturally aspirated V6, RWD, manual transmission. How many of those are left on the market? So many people (myself included) carp about how everything is going to 'turbo 4' engines and silly GameBoy 'paddle shifter' automatics. Hell, even the C8 Corvette and the new Supra are automatic only. Enthusiasts lament that there aren't any 'old school' sports cars left. Well, here it is, the 370Z.

Performance: 0-60 in 5 sec for a car you can buy new for low $30's looks pretty good to me. What else can do that? A Miata or BRZ/86 are comparably priced and a hell of a lot slower.

So many people on line have griped about the BRZ/86, how it's almost great, it's a small, RWD, manual transmission car - if only it had another 50 or 100 hp. Isn't that the 370Z? Similarly sized (if heaver), similar layout, but a lot more power?

I don't car one bit that a DCT or some other soulless electronically-controlled automatic transmission can shift gears a few hundredths or tenths of a second faster than I can. I car about how a car feels to drive, how much fun it is. To me, there's nothing that can match the sheer fun of rowing your own gears with the instantaneous response of a sweet naturally aspirated engine. I don't care that the new C8 Corvette can supposedly run 0-60 in 3 seconds. Where in this country can you do that safely and sanely? How often could you do that before either you have an unpleasant interaction with a wall or another car, or at best, lose your license? So many people seem to buy cars for bragging rights at the bar or gym. I buy them for how much fun they are for me to drive.

Yeah, the infotainment system on the 370Z is laughably old. So what? What's more important - how much fun the car is to drive, the engine, layout, and pure feel of it, or how pretty the interface is to access music from a smartphone? If you don't like the infotainment system, just buy a car without it. If you have a smartphone, you already have a better GPS than comes in almost any car.

Instead of griping about how 'old' the 370Z is, I would think true gearheads would recognize it for what it is - a gift from Nissan that they're still making it. For the few thousand a year that they sell, they can't be making any money on it. Somewhere in the messed up Nissan organization, someone realizes what the 370Z is, and quietly continues to make it as a gift to hard core car enthusiasts.

So, to all those armchair experts out there who say they want a pure, old-school, naturally aspirated, RWD, manual transmission sports car that doesn't cost an arm and a leg, I suggest, go out and buy a 370Z while you can. I think it will be gone after this model year, and it's not likely to come back (except maybe as a trim variant of the Infiniti Q60, complete with turbos and a paddle-shifted automatic, and no manual transmission). It's last call. If you don't buy a 370Z now, then shut up and don't complain that there aren't any cars like it left anymore.

I've been shopping for a 370Z for close to a year now. The biggest impediment I've had (other than being very picky about color and spec) is sleazy dealers. What is it with most Nissan dealers? I've owned over 100 cars in over 45 years of driving, pretty much every make out there, and I've never encountered such pricing bait-and-switch and other games as I have with Nissan dealers. I bet they would sell a lot more cars if they would just be more honest.