By HAMISH McRAE
Long ago I used to drive Porsches. There were a couple: a 356B convertible rusted away and was replaced by a pretty 912 Targa. This succumbed to company cars and the arrival of children.
You have to be sensible about these things but I was sufficiently miserable about the loss that my spouse promised that when we no longer needed a tank I could have another Porsche.
So, when offered a 911 Carrera to test, it seemed too good an opportunity to pass up. Would the love affair be rekindled or was it a bit absurd to drive on British roads a car that can reach 280km/h?
Of course a 2005 car is utterly different from those of the 1960's. Though the 911 broadly retains the body shape of the first 911 of 1963, it is a new design. The original air-cooled 911 soldiered on in various guises until it was replaced by the new series, with a water-cooled engine, in 1998.
The latest is the second-generation version of this series.
While the new car is vastly more powerful than the original 911 and even more so than the 912 which had the flat-four from the 356 series, it feels curiously familiar. It is partly the way you sit, quite low but with exactly the same relationship with the controls. But it is more the sense of balance as you drive.
Porsches use sophisticated engineering to create an aura of simplicity for the driver.
The 911 is sublime. Of course it is hugely powerful and hugely expensive. There is no rational way of justifying either. But it is a joy to drive. It does what you want it to do as soon as you think it. So you think you want to change lanes on the motorway: make a slight wrist movement and you are there.
You want to overtake but are in the wrong gear. Doesn't matter. There is so much power that you are past anyway. You go into a corner a bit faster than you intended. A flick of the wrist and you are through it.
Once you are given this sense of response you tend to want to respond by driving the car decently: not particularly to race but rather to get to your destination as swiftly and comfortably as posible. Occasionally that means using the power.
The engine has only 3.6 litres to produce its 245kW, remarkable for a normally aspirated engine. More remarkable is the very flat torque curve from 3000 to 6000 rpm. So when you do want the performance it just pours on the power in a steady flow.
So do I want one? I'm not sure. There is a problem. The car is designed to tell you everything about the conditions in which you are driving and that includes the road. That's fine on German roads with surfaces like a billiard table. It is not so good on the surfaces we have in Britain.
London a real misery
The 911 is terrible on speed bumps. However slowly you drive over them you are in danger of scraping its belly and it is virtually impossible to get over without touching the spoiler at the front.
That makes driving in London a real misery unless you plan to avoid bumps. It's a good argument for not living in a bump-prone borough.
But if you don't live in London and have to drive a lot, if you fundamentally like cars - and you can afford it - the 911 is hugely tempting. It solves the whole problem of what to drive because you can't really find anything that makes driving more of a delight.
But don't buy a new one. These cars are so beautifully built that, unless you are into status, wait a year or three for depreciation to kick in. And I think I'd like to drive a late-model, air-cooled 911 before going for a liquid-cooled version.
Nevertheless, Porsches are as wonderful as ever. - The Independent, London