Michael...

Regarding the transmission, I know exactly what you're talking about. Do you have the 3.0 or 4.8? I have the 4.8i and even then, I feel like the transmission shifts quite high and there the transmission is quite noisy. You can really hear the engine struggling when going up hills. I know this new X5 is much heavier than the old one, but I never one thought my old 4.4i struggled up this hill where I live. While I can live with it, I think BMW could have done a better job in this dept. I just had my car updated and I did bring it up with my dealer, and I have to say this version made some things worse.

Which leads me to the e-parking brake. I've had a number of cars with the new electro-magnetic brake...the Jag XK-R, and new S-class and those do a much better job. The X is lurchy, just like my old 745Li. When it switches from the service brake to the parking brake, you feel the whole car lurch a bit. The trick to solving that I learned is to not engage the parking brake until the car is off. That way it doesn't switch from service to parking while the car is on.

While I love this car overall, I also think the quality is subpar. The car looks great in and out, but BMW still uses a lot of hard plastics in the interior, especially the center console area and it's prone to squeaks and rattles. I'm still dealing with a bad rattle coming from my steering column.

-Chris