Transcription
Hey guys, Chris here. So, in this video, me and you, we're going to go for a drive because I don't have a lot of time to shoot and talk about this topic. And I thought it would be befitting to do it in this car, which, you know, the title is about this Audi Q6 E-tron Quattro versus the Porsche Macan. But I don't have a lot of time because this car is actually going back to Audi now. I'm, you know, done with my loan of this car, and then I'm picking up a Taycan 4S for the next few days. So this is going to be, you know, instead of a, you know, my typical review with b-roll and music and editing, this is going to be more like a podcast, a one-take, me just speaking to you. So I hope you guys are good and okay with that.
But the reason I wanted to do this now and on my way back is because I just came home last night from Germany driving the new Porsche Macan. So I drove two new models where I'm not allowed to talk about the performance and the driving impressions of those two cars, specifically about the drivetrain, the new rear-wheel drive version and the new 4S. But, you know, the car is out, you can buy a 4 and you can buy a Turbo. And that's what I want to talk about today. I want to talk about this Audi Q6 E-tron Quattro versus the Macan 4. Because if you don't know, these two cars are very closely related. They're built on the same platform, which is the PPE platform, Platform Premium Electric, which is a Volkswagen Group platform, platform which was a joint venture between Porsche and Audi under development. But Porsche actually had the lead on development, and I think that shows with this car. Because even before I drove the Macan, one of my first impressions driving this, and I've had, you know, this car, this, you know, specific car a few times now, I've also driven this car, uh, in Germany on one occasion, uh, you know, at the technical launch, and then I drove it under the media press drive in Bilbau in Northern Spain. And, you know, one of my first impressions about this car is that it is more like any Porsche to drive than any Audi before it. And, you know, I daily a Porsche Taycan Cross Turismo. I had that for two and a half years, so I would know. And you may be thinking, yeah, but what about the E-tron GT? It's also closely related to the Porsche Taycan. I think this drives closer to the Macan or any Porsche than the E-tron GT drives to the Taycan. And I've also owned an Audi E-tron GT and I had one on loan early this year and compared it directly to my Taycan. So, you know, I feel like I have a lot of experience between all of these cars and I've owned several of them. And I think this, you know, really shows that this is first a Porsche developed platform that Audi have, um, you know, been allowed to use for their models. And that is a very positive thing because, you know, Porsches are one of the best driving cars in the world, especially the electric car world. I recently drove a Porsche 911 Carrera 4S last week, also an awesome car that I would very much like to own one day. But, you know, this channel is all about electric cars. So these two cars, I, this specific car here, car I'm very fond of, you know, and this platform, great charging, great efficiency, and great driving dynamics.
Where this platform isn't good is in the sound insulation department. I just did a range test between this car and the Skoda Enyaq. Go watch that video, I will link that down below. And, you know, the results are as expected. But what was very unexpected is that the, let's say, the Enyaq, it's actually a tad bit quieter at speed on the motorway. And this car, you know, me and others who have driven this car in Norway and around the world have criticized this car for being very noisy compared to the price point. Like, this is just about as noisy as an Audi Q4 E-tron and very far away from the Q8 E-tron. The Q8 E-tron is a very quiet car, also a car I've owned personally that I have a lot of experience with. And this car is very far away from that when it comes to sound insulation and that, you know, sense of luxury. And when I drove the Macan, so yesterday, of course, driving it on German roads is very different than driving it on Norwegian roads. So you have to, you know, take this with a grain of salt. But one of my first impressions, and that car was on 22-inch wheels, the car we drove was like, yeah, this car is probably going to have a lot of tire noise when I get back to Norway. Because even on some, you know, smooth German roads outside of Stuttgart, there was, you know, a hint of tire wear. And the asphalt we have here in Norway and in Northern Europe, like Norway, Sweden, and Finland, is a lot coarser because the compound is different because it has to withstand cold winters, hard weather, and colder temperatures. So it is different. You can notice this if you cross from Sweden into Denmark. Once you cross over, you'll know the Edison Bridge. Like, every car that I've driven that I've criticized, like the Polestar 2 for being noisy, the Tesla Model Y, once you cross over there, they, yeah, like the sound from the tire reduces immensely. So I think like when it comes to tire noise and cabin noise, this car and the Macan are very similar. So let's get the elephant out of the room. There is a price difference between these two cars. You know, they had the same battery pack, 95.0 kilowatt hours usable in the Porsche and 94.9 in this. The Porsche has just to be a little bit better. And also the Porsche in the Macan 4 has 48 horsepower. This has 389. So the Porsche is going to be just 0.1 or 0.2 seconds quicker from 0 to 100 kilometers an hour. So this is this theme where the Porsche is just a little bit better in every sense. And I'm, my, I'm suspecting that the Porsche is maybe going to be a tad bit quieter also because my Taycan Cross Turismo was just a little bit quieter than my E-tron GT, and that being on bigger wheels with the Taycan, the Taycan being on 21-inch wheels, and my E-tron GT had 20-inch wheels. So, but there's not going to be a lot of difference. But where there's going to be a difference is in the pricing. So this car here, spec, this weighs 857,000 kroner before, you know, I set out and started filming this video. I expect a similar Macan, as similar as possible. You can't get them, you know, completely identical because this car is on 19-inch wheels. You can't get the Macan with 19-inch wheels, you can get the Macan with 20s. So if you go for just, you know, the base spec and you take off all the boxes, there's going to be a price difference of about 120,000 kroner. If you go for different wheel sizes or if you go for similar wheel sizes, it's going to be about 100,000 kroner. So about 10 to 12,000, no, 8 to 8 to 10,000 depending on your market. And for that, that is the big price difference.
And the cars I drove yesterday, I drove two different cars. And those cars are fully spec. Pretty much like you have one car had the upgraded comfort seats, the other car had the upgraded sports seats. This has the sports seats, but they're not as comfortable as in the Porsche. They're a little bit harsher. That was my immediate impression after, you know, landed at an airport yesterday and I went out and got some something to eat, hopped into this car. I'm like, hmm, this seat isn't as soft as I remember either the sport seat or the comfort seat I drove in the Macan yesterday. And I drove both. So I mean, they're going to be similar spec. These two cars and the Porsche, the ones I drove yesterday, highly spec cars. Like one had Burmester, the other one had Bose. So it's not going to be a fair comparison. But the Porsche in general, even if you go for, you know, the base spec, it's going to have leather interior, it's going to have a higher quality interior, and it is a very different experience. And you can hear how noisy this car is. I'm having to raise my voice. Yes, there is like a like a baller hair between the lanes and I can really hear like noise from from that separation and also from the tires. But like, I'd say like sporty wise, they are quite similar to drive though. The Porsches I drove were on air suspension and I haven't driven this car on air suspension since May. So I don't have that fresh in memory. But the Porsche is just going to be a little bit more sportier to drive than it is. And this on air suspension is going to be a little bit more compliant. The Porsche is going to be a little bit sharper to drive in the steering. But I don't think there's a big difference. Like in the driving experience, I don't think there's more like a, maybe the Porsche is 10% sharper and this is maybe 5% more comfortable, right? So it depends on what you're looking for. But the big difference I think is in the interior experience and also exterior styling. I think this, in the right spec, looks really nice. In this spec, this looks boring. The Porsche in a cheap spec looks nicer than this in a cheap spec. But I think this, in the right spec, like with the S line, with the right color, and the wheels, I think this actually looks better than the Porsche in my opinion. So I mean, those are all personal preferences. But I think the interior experience in this is very different. Here you're going to have bigger screens. Both have, you know, the same optional augmented reality in-head-up display, which is very good. Me personally, I'm not a fan of head-up display, so I wouldn't option it at all, even though it is very good. But like the infotainment system, you have a much bigger screen here. This is like 14.5 or 14.1 inches, whereas in the Porsche it's 10.9 inches. So this is going to have a more modern like experience with the infotainment system and also with the driver display. Like if you're into tech, I think this is a better car. Both have optional passenger screens, which I think just is just a waste of money. Every time I have a passenger in one of these cars, they're like, oh, cool screen. And then after like two minutes, they're like, how do I turn it off? So I think that's a waste of time unless you have like a, you know, a passenger who really likes that, like your partner or maybe kids or something like that. But I don't know, maybe an iPad is better.
But I think the biggest difference is in the interior experience where that Porsche is just going to feel so much more upmarket. Like this has cheap and nasty plastics up high in the cabin. The plastics on top of the doors here aren't necessarily the nicest. Some of the switch gear isn't, you know, the best. And also the HVAC controls are on-screen here, even though that works nicely. The Porsche has physical HVAC controls. So I think the Porsche just, you know, if you compare the cheapest versions of both cars, I think the Porsche is, you know, feels like a class or two above. This feels like a higher quality product. So I think just at that price difference, for me, it's worth going for the Porsche. But the thing with the Porsche is that of course there are more models available. But we're going to keep this to specking, you know, the, uh, the similar, you know, performance versions, the 4 versus this Quattro. And in the Porsche, you can, if you want to spend a little bit more money, you can get the upgraded leather, you can, you know, option different color seat belts, you can do, you know, steering wheel with like Race-Tex, which is an Alcantara type of material. You can go one up on the stereo for the Burmester. You can go for, you know, the Alcantara headliner, again, called Race-Tex. So with a Porsche, if you have that extra budget, you know, for example, say you want more of a luxurious experience and you don't need the performance, you can start comparing this SQ6 version of this with a highly speced Porsche Macan 4. And I think that's the route I would go because the experience, the luxurious experience we had in those Porsches yesterday is miles different to this. And also you have, you know, color options for the interior seat belts, you can do the Sport Chrono clock in different, you can do, you know, the trim on the doors in different colors, you can do the inserts on the seats in custom colors. Like there's a lot of things you can do with a Porsche where it feels a lot more closer to a Bentley and this feels closer to a Volkswagen. So there's a real difference in that aspect. If you're into that, I'm really into that. I daily a Porsche Taycan. I have the upgraded leather and it's such a nice experience. And I'm going to pick that car up now. Before I go into that other portion, I'm going to pick up my my Taycan Cross Turismo. So for me, I think there's too much of a difference in the interior where I would, I would rather than specking this car out, I would probably go for a Macan with less options because it's just going to overall give you a much more premium experience.
So let's talk about, you know, practicality. The Macan is more like a Cayenne Coupe, as I talked about in my, I have a full tour of one of the cars I drove yesterday, which is up on my channel now. Beautiful spec, but that car is so much more expensive than it is. It's not even worth talking about. But like in the front, this feels much more roomy. Like the Macan, the roof line is closer, you just feel more cramped. The cabin is as wide, but it just feels more cramped in front of the Porsche. And especially in the rear. Like none of these cars have, you know, particularly impressive rear seats. This isn't much bigger than what you find in the Audi Q4 E-tron. But it does feel more cramped compared to the now, the Macan feels more cramped compared to this. And also on paper, even though this has a smaller trunk than the Macan, Macan has 400, 550 liters, this has 526. Yeah, this is more practical because of that SUV shape. So I think overall, like if you have a lower budget, if your budget is like around 850,000 kroner, this is a very good car. You're going to get that fast charging, you're going to get, you know, good performance. There, I mean, this car does feel fast, especially compared to something like the Volkswagen ID7 GTX, which is a car I'm very fond of. This doesn't have a lot more power, but when you're going at higher speeds, like passing or on a motorway, and maybe you live in Germany, this just has a higher top speed and more performance, you know, up high in that speed range. So this is much more like a performance car compared to that Volkswagen. But the Volkswagen ID7 GTX, like is maybe the car I would go for instead of this. Like I would save my money and go for that because I'm really fond of that car. Or I would spend more money on a Macan. I just think this falls into kind of a black hole because like if it was quieter than the Macan, if it was a lot more comfortable, if it had a nicer interior than it has, it would be closer in my mind to the Macan. But I think the gap, even with that price difference, is just bigger. I mean, you can get a Macan for the price of this if you just don't take off any options. And I think that car is actually a better experience than this. Yeah, you're not going to get Matrix LEDs like this has. Maybe you're going to get the standard seats with no memory. You're not going to, this has the Audi sound system, like it's one upgrade, but it doesn't have a panoramic roof. It has Matrix LED headlights, but like I, for the most part, drive on lit motorways like with street lights or in the city. Like I don't use Matrix LEDs. Like for me, that's a waste of money. If you live in a place where you're using that, of course, that's going to be well worth the investment. But like I would, like if I were on a budget of the price of this, 850,000 kroner or about 80,000, I'd go for a barebones Macan. I just think it's going to give you a better driving experience.
So guys, that was a long rant. I don't want to go on too long, but that's just my immediate experience. So I'm going to test the Macan hopefully when they get, you know, press cars on our region roads and not very long. And then I can do like a proper, you know, assessment, do my range test, do my long trip test, and also, you know, have the car for a week instead of just driving, you know, the car for a few hours, which I did yesterday. But I thought it would be interesting for you to just hear my opinions, my fresh memory having driven that Macan or several Macans yesterday. A really nice car, I like it. But I think I like the Taycan better. And I'm going to hop into my Taycan and then I'm going to hop into the new 4S. So stay tuned for that. If you want to see my impressions, maybe I'll bring up this topic again comparing it to the Macan. So for that, subscribe to the channel. We're almost at 50,000 subscribers, guys. You guys have been awesome lately. Like this subscriber count has been growing immensely and it really helps me out a lot. I'm getting invited to more events because more car manufacturers are recognizing that, yeah, you guys like my channel. So thanks a lot, guys. And thanks a lot for watching this video. So I hope you enjoyed today's topic. If you did, please drop me a thumbs up down below. And for more car content, as always, please subscribe. See you guys later. Goodbye.