Just another opinion from a cold weather climate. My wife traded in her 2009 MCS just last month and picked up a Roadster S. We ended up getting a rather fully loaded S off a lot in MI, because we wanted to take advantage of the lease deals and incentives that they were offering and we could not order a 2013 at the time we were making a decision (had to go for a 14, and this would negate the lease deals and the incentives)

I have been bad and not sent out photos to this forum, but will as soon as time allows. just to give you some background - she had her share of minivans and SUV's when the kids were younger, and when they started to get older, she jumped into the 2009 MCS. She always wanted a convertible so when we found the Roadster it was perfect fit for her.

All that being said, and with the options that we have on it, her opinions of must haves vs. nice to haves vs. OK it was already on the car:

Must haves:
Auto transmission
Premium 1 package - i know for 2014 that might not exist, but the auto climate control, rain sensors, and auto headlights were a must.
Technology package 2 - this has the HK sound system and the Comfort access
I think that the comfort acess might be a stand alone option also, but once you have lived with it for a few days, you will wonder why all cars dont have it. (I also have it on my Infiniti FX also) I really had to talk her into this, and when we found the car it was already included, but she is very very happy that it has this.
The HK sound system is much better than the stock issue. You might have to play with the bass control and it is very "bassy", but it is significantly better sounding IMO.

Sport package is nice to have, mainly due to the Xenon headlights. Really didn't need the 17" wheels, DTS, or white turn signals, but they were on the car already.

MINI wired including NAV. the NAV system is OK, but my wife really wanted to have this also. I would say that it is not as good as the one in the Infiniti, but you need to remember the inside of the car is not that big, so by having the NAV in the dash, makes for a cleaner overall look to the interior. It will not be as good as an iPhone, but we had a Garmin on the MCS dash and it was kind of "clunky".

We also wanted a leather interior and this build has the soda satellite gray lounge leather with the mini yours sport leather steering wheel. The look of this interior with the red exterior is pretty cool looking. This might push the envelope for you in regards to price, but something to consider.

BT phone setup was simple and no issues with the top down and in town driving. highway is a little tough on the driver to hear, but the person on the other end of the phone did not have any issues.

With having a little over 1000 miles on it now, she is happier now than even when we drove it home. It has been a very welcome addition to our family.

Good luck to you and welcome to the family!!!!

 

+1 on the backup sensors....they did a very cool job on that....you get an audible tone on either the left, right, or center through the stereo so you know where the object is. the display shows the approximate size and shape of the object in relation to the car based on feedback from the sonar, and changes from green to yellow to red with increasing audible frequency....not a backup camera, but they came pretty darn close

my fear is always that i will be in a parking lot, ready to back up, check the rear, then some dopey kid wanders behind my bumper from another car that was perhaps parked next to me and even with a car low to the ground, I might not see the kid/object..

 

my wife went from a convertible to the JCW Roaster and loves it.

 

Well my wife ordered her roadster today!

Thanks to all who offered their advice and comments

She pretty much stuck with what she originally built;

S Roadster
Pepper White
Pepper White dash
Black stripes
Cold weather package
Automatic
16" 6- star twin spoke wheels, black
Automatic climate control
Mini connected W/Nav package
Rear fog lights

Decided against HK sound and backup sensors for budgetary reasons !

We kept the payments to $400/Mo after trade of 07 MCS cabrio. which was our target

Only bad thing is 2 month wait

Hoping there are no delays!

Steve

 

Well Steve congrats! but . . .

. . . I want my time back . . .


.

 

[QUOTE=TG.;3784760]Well Steve congrats! but . . .



. . . I want my time back . . .

Thanks TG, when I get the flux capacitor up and running I'll send some time your way
Send me a bill for what we owe you!

Steve

 

Don't think you can go wrong with any Mini config Steve - it is what suits her best. Keep us up to date on the progress in the Those waiting for a 2013" Support Group thread.

That Pepper White will look awesome. I was considering a Clubman for a short while and it definitely would have been Pepper White.

 

Congrats!

You will adore this car.

 

Shoulda gone manual! She'll enjoy it though either way.

 

BTW it's a 2014!
I'll post any differences if any, but by reading posts about '13-'14 I don't think that there's anything significant for the Roadster.

Anybody else on Long Island? I don't think I've seen a Roadster yet!

Steve

 

Jenn can't drive one and has no interest in learning

When we first met I had a Z3 manual,I tried to teach her but she was nervous about grinding gears in a nice car,and thought ,why bother?.
We actually took the test drive in a manual, so she test passengered the car, I drove! She traded a MCS so she knew how it drove and she loved the way it looks!

As they say, happy wife happy life

Steve

 

I purchased Navigon for $22. I just got the West Coast maps which is enough for me. I can upgrade to full US later if I want.

It works well, but it is first and foremost a GPS based app, which is good and bad. Good in that all maps are local. You download states you have access to on an individual basis so you don't have everything on the phone taking up space. California alone is about 110MB.

Bad in that it doesn't understand addresses like Waze, Google or Apple does. So, you cannot simply copy and paste "1234 Main Street, San Francisco, CA" in the search box and get a hit. Instead, like most GPS units, Garmin in particular, you have to first enter the city or zip, confirm the state, then the street, then the street number. That is fine if you have the address on paper, but stupid if you have it in an email or on a web page.

That said, it is a nice $22 insurance policy, better than the $1,500 Mini charges for it.

Interestingly, Waze has some caching ability. I took a 250mi trip through the SoCal mountains to Julian, CA and lost signal a number of times, but Waze kept me going. Not sure how long that would last. I was never out of signal more than 5-10 min before I picked up another tower. I wouldn't want to test that in some of the more remote parts of the US.

 

Picked up our Roadster today after work!
Our salesman/MA, George was great,we got there at 5:45 and they close at 6:00 (we told them that was the earliest we could get there), and he did not rush us at all, took our trade, did the paperwork and went over the car with us, it took about an hour.
Put the top down and drove home, I even made room in the garage for her, and our garage has never seen a car! Now I know why garage doors are so big
Well, we'll play with it more tomorrow ,here's a quick pic!

 

Congrats! You're going to love it. It is very addictive to drive the MINI roadster. You're going to come up with all sorts of excuses to go for a drive. Haha!

It's so funny how many people don't put their car in the garage.
We have a long and narrow garage and could not put both car in until finally we got the MINI. Now I'm so glad I can! You'll see that keeping the car inside truly goes a long way to keep the car in new condition for the longest time possible.

 

Congratulations! As you can see from my configuration below, I have a special affinity for Pepper White Roadsters. I hope you enjoy your motoring this fine Sunday afternoon.

 

Almost all colors are but pepper white is sooo much better in real life than online and certainly from the configurator...

 

Your right ,we never thought we'd get a white car but we took a test drive in one and Jenn really liked the way it looked with the black top and trim! So we added the stripes and wheels!
Thanks again for everyone's input and I'll post more pics soon,

Steve