Alx

When - ONLY REGISTERED AND ACTIVATED USERS CAN SEE ALL LINKS - CLICK HERE TO REGISTER on a - ONLY REGISTERED AND ACTIVATED USERS CAN SEE ALL LINKS - CLICK HERE TO REGISTER, they were none to pleased that BMW's engineers wouldn't allow drivers to fully disable the traction control. At the time, we assumed that BMW's legal boffins pictured overly enthusiastic Americans, stomping the go pedal and promptly winding up in a ditch.

Not so, according to Car. The magazine learned that the M division had no way of controlling clutch plate actuation, which would normally quell the axle tramp caused by the V10's prodigious power delivery. Acceleration times would rise and drivetrain components' lifetimes would fall. Hence, the only conceivable solution was to make the DSC a permanent fixture within the Bimmer's brain.

Still, you can partly disable the system in M Dynamic mode within iDrive (if you dare), but that may not be enough for those who want to test the limits of adhesion of the 285s in the rear.

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Imhotep Evil

So the car was made to be slower thus more reliable ?!

Bleah...

bmer

Well, reliability problems wouldn't be very good for M5's reputation, you know.

BMW Power

BMW is already suffering from terrible reliability issues on the smg M5's. I hope they get them sorted out soon as its creating a bad image for them

Imhotep Evil

I've always knewed that the F1 inspired M5 will have problems with the manual.

Just_me

BMW is finally offering a software update so you can turn off traction control 100% on a manual M5.

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Tarek

First time i know that the E60 M5 can be ordered with a manual

coolraoul

Only in the States and few other countries I think...Because the motor is only thought to go with the SMG.... They just took the old M5 gearbox (a little adapted to the power), so... The car is far from beeing as good as the SMG-M5.

But the SMG has a terrible reliability like BMW Power said.

Sunny

It is actually the manual transmission from the 550 (and I think even the new M3 uses the same transmission). SMG had reliability issues the first year it was out, but I think it is mostly ironed out.

Just_me

in the beginning yes but new software has coming through the years so SMG3 better than ever.