my Taycan vs my 911

[Scandinavian]

But you had such a lot of space there. Here in Southern France you will never find such a huge spot for parking. You are so close to front and rear that the option Would be unusable and a waste of money.

 

[Murph7355]

My lower right button is: "auto-park". Only the brave press it.

Thanks.

Think Frank was right... It's option dependent.

I'll see if I can turn off remote park as the chances of me using it are nil - it's less able to park than the wife. Maybe that will give me the cameras icon.

(Why can't you just choose these shortcuts... Porsche?!).

 

[RGBArgee]

Interesting to read your comparison.
I have had x2 Taycan 4S CT in last 18 months- lovely car but…..
I have just sold a 21 Targa 4S for a new 911 Turbo S.
the Taycan whilst lovely does not fill me with confidence on a reliability front although to be fair had a few issues with Targa, flat battery, roof failure. I’m wondering if I’m jinxed or is it the OPC? Lack of staff, lack of loan cars etc etc. Sorry this sounds rather negative and I’m not normally a negative person but Porsche DE GB and my local dealer between them leave me disappointed.

 

[MrTossYoSalad]

Thank you for the write up! I am on the fence about the lack of physical HVAC controls... that touchscreen in the Taycan is a huge turn off for me.

Actually living with it, is it that much of a pain for the day to day? Fiddling with touch screens while im driving has been a turn off for me.

 

[ben1]

I like your bold choice of car colors !

 

[feye]

Exactly that, but as an EV with large battery...

 

[Chas1]

I know this comparison has been covered numerous times before and I'm probably not noting anything 100 other people on here don't already know, but I'm adding my perspective anyway.

Background
I have both a 2021 Taycan 4S and a 2023 911 GTS Cabriolet 7MT (manual).

I had the Taycan for around 2 years/25k miles before taking delivery of the 911. The Taycan is my wife's DD (I drove [still sometimes drive] a Macan S) but I put about 1/2 the miles on the Taycan driving evenings and weekends.

I took delivery of the 911 in July of this year and put a little over 12k miles on it in the last 3.5 months, over which period I didn't drive the Taycan at all. Absolutely zero Taycan driving.

Well, the 911 is in the shop getting the the front bumper replaced so I started driving the Taycan again yesterday. Having a several month long lapse in driving it and coming back gave me some thoughts that I'll put in no particular order below.

Driving Position
I have 14-way ventilated/massage seats in the Taycan and 18-way RaceTex in the 911. I've read that the Taycan seating position is similar to the 911, however, I immediately noticed how much higher I was sitting in the Taycan. It's not nearly as high as my Macan, but still noticeably higher. Note that I always lower my seats as much as possible in all vehicles.

Actually, looking back, I was a little worried I wouldn't like the 911 seating position because I kept reading this comparison, that they're similar, and didn't feel like the Taycan was low enough. But I think there's a noticeable difference.

As a result, Taycan ingress/egress is much easier (even with the B pillar placement). I don't find the 911 difficult in an absolute sense. Just more difficult relative to the Taycan (which is more difficult than the Macan). Overall, I prefer the 911.

Door Weight
Probably to be expected with 2-door vs 4-door sizing, but the Taycan doors immediately felt much lighter opening, particularly pushing open from the inside. Perhaps I am too feeble to own a 2-door car.

Torque
I'm sure I don't even need to cover this, but Taycan jerk is substantially more than the 911. I still love slamming the accelerator pedal in sport mode around 40-50 mph (close to 65-80 kph , in Canada ?), and feeling that jerk forward. The 911 is fun for its own reasons, but it simply does not do this the way the Taycan does.

Sound
I'm putting sports cats on the 911 this winter, and possibly a different cat-back exhaust after that. That's after I've already put on a valve controller to keep the valves open and already have PSE. More/better sound is a goal and part of the drive.

I thought I'd miss this driving the Taycan, but I don't. My Taycan has the optional thermal and noise insulating glass (...contrast that with the cab, which has very little noise insulation with the top down ?).

But the lack of sound almost feels like as much of a goal in the Taycan as the presence of sound does in the 911. It's not necessarily worse as I was expecting. Just different.

Interior Control and Ergonomics
A number of small items to cover here.

Volume Control - I really like having a regular volume knob in the 911.

Diamond Buttons (and friends?) - I only have one diamond button on the 911 because I optioned Front Axle Lift which takes the place of the second diamond button. And the one I have is on the steering wheel, so not always quick to find when my wheel is turned. This is set to park assist cameras because I use that option the most, which means homelink is only on the PCM, buried in a menu. It does come up based on geolocation, but not as early as I like. I'd have to set the geolocation 3 time from different routes to my house to expand it though.

The Taycan, on the other hand, has two diamond buttons all of the time (I'm not aware of any options that remove one), and the park assist cameras are on their own separate button on the center console. I have the instrument cluster diamond button set to homelink so it's in a consistent place also. So, homelink and park assist end up much easier to access on the Taycan.

HVAC - I prefer the physical controls for temperature, fan speed, and auto setting on the 911...however anything that isn't on those physical controls has to be accessed under a PCM menu, which is a pain while driving. Things like "sync" on the dual zone climate control or the air recirculation are ones that I use often enough that I'm annoyed by having to access that menu when they are front and center in the Taycan.

PCM - It's probably enough to say that I was never annoyed by the PCM menus on the Taycan because I basically never needed to use them. I have to occasionally use them for a couple of functions on the 911 and now I hate them.

But a link below to my glowing review of the Taycan PCM. ?

https://www.taycanforum.com/forum/threads/help-i-accidentally-liked-the-pcm.5750/

Fun
This is subject, of course, but I can tell you my kid only looks like this in one of the two cars*.

*In the other car, he looks like a banana. ?

I'm kidding.

That would be weird.

----------------------------

That's it for now. I won't get into other things regarding gas vs recharging. I've probably beat that drum enough. Suffice to say I've driven the 911 2000+ miles from home while the Taycan has never been more than 125 miles from home (....at least not since delivery). And when used in those manners, for me, they each serve their own purpose very well.

I'm glad to have both cars.

Pics For Attention (including the poor Macan that doesn't get as much love as it should anymore).

Interesting comparison. Personally I’d love a Taycan two door coupe. Maybe a 2 plus 2 with a hatch back. That would be perfect. Come on Porsche get on with it!

 

[Jhenson29]

I am on the fence about the lack of physical HVAC controls... that touchscreen in the Taycan is a huge turn off for me.

The HVAC is mostly a non issue. The screen controls are quite large and the screen is also haptic, so it has feedback when you press (feels like a click). And as I noted, in many ways, it’s better than the physical controls in the 911 because more items are readily available instead of in a separate menu.

The only thing I really don’t like about the HVAC is the lack of physical adjustment on the vents. This can only be controlled in a screen and is not my preference.

Aside from the HVAC vents, the only other touch screen controls that annoy me are the volume buttons. There is a physical roller on the steering wheel for volume, and that’s fine for the driver. But when I’m a passenger, I hate using the touch screen for volume. A knob is much easier.

Overall, while there’s room for improvement, I think the Taycan controls are very well done.

 

[Jhenson29]

I like your bold choice of car colors !

The guards red was settling when Lava Orange was discontinued for 2023 and PTS stop sale prevented me from ordering gulf orange. But it turns out I like GR more than I thought I would. It didn’t feel like settling after delivery.

My other considerations were were shark blue or Python green, but I didn’t want two cars of the same color.

 

[Jhenson29]

Exactly that, but as an EV with large battery...

I would agree if it were against a PDK.
But I do love my manual….

That’s not a PDK. I know. I don’t need corrections. But the boredom sure rings true.

At least with an EV, I can try to ignore the fact that the transmission is boring by enjoying the jerk.

 

[Daniel]

But you had such a lot of space there. Here in Southern France you will never find such a huge spot for parking. You are so close to front and rear that the option Would be unusable and a waste of money.

I confirm .....

 

[or1]

The HVAC is mostly a non issue. The screen controls are quite large and the screen is also haptic, so it has feedback when you press (feels like a click). And as I noted, in many ways, it’s better than the physical controls in the 911 because more items are readily available instead of in a separate menu.

The only thing I really don’t like about the HVAC is the lack of physical adjustment on the vents. This can only be controlled in a screen and is not my preference.

Aside from the HVAC vents, the only other touch screen controls that annoy me are the volume buttons. There is a physical roller on the steering wheel for volume, and that’s fine for the driver. But when I’m a passenger, I hate using the touch screen for volume. A knob is much easier.

Overall, while there’s room for improvement, I think the Taycan controls are very well done.

I agree the Taycan controls are quite well done. A slight use disadvantage with haptic screen instead of buttons, but the flexibility of what can be shown and entered there is important I think.

And having had a button failure in an Audi, with temperature stuck at 16 degrees C, not having buttons may have definite advantages too.

 

[f1eng]

I would agree if it were against a PDK.
But I do love my manual….

That’s not a PDK. I know. I don’t need corrections. But the boredom sure rings true.

At least with an EV, I can try to ignore the fact that the transmission is boring by enjoying the jerk.

I totally relate to this and stick with manual for sports cars - which is why mine is 25 years old.

In traffic on the 2-way roads around here with only short straight bits where overtaking may be possible the instant throttle response of an EV is massively better than any IC engined car because no delay changing down or lag in the ubiquitous turbos - I have owned 1 turbo car in my life and the only places it was brilliant were places I almost never go never again.

 

[Jhenson29]

An update: I drove the Taycan to work today, and I drove myself and two coworkers to lunch. After, we went for a short “test drive”. Part of that was accelerating flat out for a period of time.

And it was boring. So boring. The first second or two, yeah, okay, but after that…

There’s no sound…and it’s so smooth after the initial jerk….

The closest thing I could liken it to is riding in an elevator. ?

I think one of them asked at one point “Is it…is it still going?” ?‍

However, a couple of weeks ago, I had done the exact same thing with one of them in the 911. We weren’t bored. Well, a little bored waiting for the oil to get up to temperature. But not after that.

 

[bsclywilly]

Agree so much on the lack of noise. Deceptively fast, but boring.

I wonder who decided to design EVs to be as silent as possible. Raw motor noises are actually pretty cool. Here’s a preview of some experimenting I’ve been doing recording EV sounds.