Ok, so heres the deal:

I want to replace my wife's car sometime this year, she wants a car (not suv/sav/hybrid/etc.) with AWD (winter, safety, etc,). Our strongest contender has been an XI 3 series. I personally think the E46 325XI is a bit underpowered (she might not), but the E90 has 215 ponies (quite a bit better).

I stoppped by my dealer and spoke to my sales advisor (got a hot-off-the-press E90 brochure). He says XI's may be out by fall, but not confirmed. He also said he has a few new E46's on the lot that they would love to move before the E90's come. He has 2 new MY '05 330xi's, pp, step, xenon, hk, cold weather, etc-both silver w/ black leather. He offered either to me at $5k off MSRP, leaving the final price at about $39k or so for either.

When pricing out an similarly equipped '06 325XI, the price would be about $1k MORE than the '05 E46 330XI.

Any opinions on what to go for? I'm not in a hurry to pick up a car, so urgency is not a factor. He also has a few 325xi's that I'm sure he'd part with at a discount, I'm sure. I would convince my wife of the 330, of course.

Sorry for the long post, but I value the opinions of my fellow X5 World board members. TIA!

PS.- He asked me to call him either way in a couple of weeks as they will have some E90 demos in for test driving. Anyone checked one out in person yet?