SAAB 9-3 XWD

First impressions

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This Saab doesn't look any different to the 9-3 Aero we tested late in 2007, you're thinking. And you'd be right. So how come we're saying this is a first-drive? Because, beneath, it's a car of real significance, that's why. Here, readers, is the first-ever four-wheel-drive Saab. The Swedish maker has long sworn by front-wheel-drive, of course. An engineer told me that the difference between front-drive and rear-drive in snowy Sweden is that front-drive keeps people mobile. All-wheel-drive naturally is even better at this, but it's a very expensive way of doing things, particularly if you're perennially underfunded, as Saab has been for years.

But, engineers being engineers, they tinker. What, they mused, would a 9-3 be like, using the Haldex 4WD system that turns front-drive Golfs and TTs into all-drivers? The platform wasn't designed for it, but they're engineers, so solutions could be found. Find them they did. And cigar-chomping GM bosses were so impressed, they handed over responsibility for all GM's front-drive-based 4WD models to Saab. Bingo. Sufficient funds duly released, Saab's been able to give the 9-3 a late-life flourish, with its most technically interesting model in decades. The tech is first seen on the special-edition Turbo X, but the XWD is the mainstream model, arriving later in 2008.
Performance

This super-smooth engine may lack character, but it's a technological marvel. Twin turbos contrast the V6's basic lack of torque (you can feel it if you ask, well, anything of it off-boost) with fantastic shove (up 15 per cent here), while impeccably smooth-running means gunning it is like dropping into a swimming pool full of silk. Listen hard, and there's even some of the Astra VXR's Darth Vader exhaust roar. Shame the notchy, long-winded manual gearbox remains pretty poor; the auto, with tactile steering wheel paddles, is easily preferable. But the most significant change here is this: you can use this power.