By Jil McIntosh
 2008 Porsche Boxster. Click image to enlarge |
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2008 Porsche Boxster
Oshawa, Ontario – If I had to describe the Porsche Boxster in one word, I think it would be “accessible.”
Among sports machines, few can match this roadster, the “entry level” in the Porsche car line-up, for its versatility. It’s smooth and stable enough that it can make even a mediocre driver look good; at the same time, you can wind it up, and it’ll put a smile on the face of even the most hard-core enthusiast. And while it’ll take on the twisties without breaking a sweat, it can also be guided through downtown traffic without causing the driver to tax his super-strength antiperspirant.
I took out two models, the Boxster and the Boxster S. Visually they’re very similar, save for an extra opening in the middle of the S’s front fascia, along with dual exhaust tips and red-painted calipers to the regular Boxster’s single pipe and black brakes. The Boxster also rides on 17-inch wheels, compared to 18-inch for the S, although my car was optioned with the larger rims.
  2008 Porsche Boxster (top); 2008 Porsche Boxster S. Click image to enlarge |
The big difference is in the mid-mounted powerplant. In both cases, it’s a horizontally-opposed six-cylinder, but in the Boxster it’s a 2.7-litre making 245 horsepower and 201 lb-ft of torque, while in the Boxster S, it’s a 3.4-litre with a resulting jump to 295 horsepower and 251 lb-ft of torque. The S uses a six-speed manual; the Boxster can be optionally equipped with one, but my tester had the default five-speed. A Tiptronic S automatic can be swapped for the stick shift in either vehicle.
My Boxster’s bright red paint got considerably more attention than my S’s relatively drab Atlas Grey Metallic – a shade that added a jaw-dropping $4,390 to the final tally – but both of them got the looks when I stopped at traffic lights. There’s no mistaking the Boxster’s sensual, organic curves, and they’re so well proportioned that the car always surprises me by the fact that it’s a larger vehicle than you think, once you get up close to it. The extra length translates into two surprisingly spacious trunks, one fore and one aft that will easily let two of you pack enough for a long weekend and still have some room left over for souvenirs.
One thing I always find interesting about Porsche vehicles is how very basic they are. Almost everything is optional, which means that on one hand, you can pick and choose items to the point that your car is practically custom-built and possibly the only one so outfitted; on the other hand, it means that the car’s price shoots up pretty rapidly once you start checking off the boxes. Adding bi-xenon headlamps, heated seats, 18-inch wheels, wind deflector, automatic climate control, high-end sound package and floor mats took my Boxster from $58,100 to $64,340; on the Boxster S, the $70,200 starting price was boosted by the paint, auto-dimming mirrors, bi-xenons, heated seats, Cayman S-style wheels and caps, deflector, automatic climate control, sound package, sport exhaust and floor mats to $82,820. Such personalization is pretty much standard among premium auto companies, although I find it difficult to justify an extra $680 for heated seats on a car that starts at $70,000, especially since the Kia in my driveway also had them, for about $45,000 less.
  2008 Porsche Boxster S. Click image to enlarge |
Unusually among automakers, though, both Porsche models had $1,450 subtracted from the price as a “market adjustment” for currency exchanges (still, it’s a set amount, not a percentage of the base MSRP).
Driving a Porsche is exactly as you’d expect it to be: incredibly responsive, stiff enough to toss into the tightest corner but with enough suspension compliance to be comfortable, and perfectly balanced. I joked that my cars came equipped with a Lane Departure Warning system: feedback is so good that you can feel when a tire touches the white line. Braking on both is excellent, although the S has larger discs and you can feel it grabbing harder. Stability control – dubbed PSM, for Porsche Stability Management – is standard equipment, along with a button for disabling it.
Both cars wind up through the gears to get you from zero to good-afternoon-officer faster than you realize, with a great exhaust note along the way (especially with the S’s optional sport exhaust), but you do notice a difference when driving the two back-to-back, and for my money, I prefer the Boxster. The S’s more powerful engine and the closer coupling of its six cogs means you get off the line faster, and you’ll have to wind the regular Boxster further up the tach to push you hard into the seat, but I found the smaller engine feels more at home in this package, with just the right power to weight ratio. It’s also more usable in everyday traffic, especially when I turned south into the city, rather than north to the empty rural roads; crawling along in stop-and-go isn’t as painful in the regular Boxster. Of course, if you always “turn north”, or if track time is part of your plan, then you’ll probably want to step up to the S, but don’t automatically think that bigger always equals better.
Given that a sports car usually means I’ll eat up most of my pay in gasoline, the Boxster models also provide surprising relief at the pumps. They need premium fuel, of course, but the Boxster returned a combined 11.7 L/100 km for me (against its published rate of 10.1 highway and 6.8 city), while the Boxster S clocked in at a combined 12.2 L/100 km (against its published 11.8 and 7.7), both of them in cold weather and with repeated heavy use of the “fun” pedal.
  2008 Porsche Boxster (top photos); 2008 Porsche Boxster S. Click image to enlarge |
That wintery weather meant that the top dropped only for photos (yes, I’m a wuss), but it’s a very simple system: once you release the top at the header panel, you hold a switch that opens a metal tonneau and automatically folds the soft top under it. The top is lined and the car is surprisingly quiet for a convertible when it’s up. But as with most convertibles, the best sightlines are obtained when the top is stowed; when it’s up, rear visibility is horrible, and lane changes are made with much mirror-checking and then a final quick prayer that nothing was missed alongside the car’s muscular flanks.
The cabin provides a fair bit of shoulder room, the seats are comfortable and bolstered for hard turns, and the pedals, shifter and wheel are arranged into perfect position. Interior panel fit is superb, as is to be expected (and should you be so inclined, you can have the dash covered in leather). All controls are backlit, as all controls should be. Interior storage space is limited, but while the centre console cubby is very shallow, the designers have cleverly utilized the otherwise dead space under the door armrest: lift the padded cover, and there’s a fairly deep well.
Quibbles? Of course, there are always quibbles. The climate and stereo buttons are small and identical, and you need to take your eyes off the road for too long to change anything. The stereo also takes a while to figure out, even with the owner’s manual at hand. The Porsche crest on the key is visible from a mile away, but the keyless functions are solid black buttons and could use a splash of white paint on them to make them easier to differentiate. (There’s also only one button for both lock and unlock, and you’ll have to depend on the horn chirp to be sure you’ve actually buttoned it up.)
And Germans are much smarter than we are, in that they stop their cars and sit in a café when they want a cup of coffee. No doubt as a result, the Boxster’s cupholders are slim little plastic rings that pop out of the dash and do a great job of holding a cup of liquid directly over the centre stack controls or your passenger’s knee.
But all of that is a moot point when there’s an open road in front of you, and that black, red and gold crest is on the nose of your vehicle. Someone once asked me why all “yuppies” seemed to gravitate toward Porsches – was it because they were all mindless clones, he asked? No, I told him; it’s because these cars are so great to drive that people who can afford them, buy them. Sure, it’s a lot of coin. But then, the Boxster is a lot of car.
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Pricing: 2008 Porsche Boxster and Boxster S
Base price: $58,100 Options: $ 7,690 (Bi-xenon headlamp package, $1,530; heated seats, $680; 18-inch S wheels, $1,730; wind deflector, $525; automatic climate control, $770; Bose high-end sound package, $2,330; floor mats in interior colour, $125)
Base price: $70,200 Freight: $1,085
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