Nissan 370Z vs BMW M Models

What's the difference?

Road testing the Nissan 370Z in 2011, I noted it was getting on. Yes, the rear-wheel drive two-seater had been given a design freshen up and a bigger engine a couple of years prior, but the 350Z it was based on had hit the local market way back in 2003. And it wasn't unreasonable to expect replacement or retirement in the not-too-distant future.

Okay, so that was seven years ago, which means if you (like many) consider the 370Z to be an update of the 350Z (the transition happening in 2009), this car has been on sale for 15 years straight. Can you imagine Apple trying to sell any one product without entirely reinventing it for that long?

You might say that makes it a modern classic; so good it's only required an occasional touch up to keep it on the Sports Car Most Wanted list. And in recent years, a consistent average of 30 Aussies a month have slotted a shiny new 370Z in their driveway.

But a less-charitable type will tell you time waits for no car, and with arch rival Toyota about to lob a Supra-shaped hand grenade over the parapet, this enduring campaigner is under the pump.

So, Nissan's reached into its bag of tricks and given the 370Z yet another cosmetic tszuj-up and added a high-performance clutch to the manual version.

Is it enough to keep Nissan's eternal Z-car flame burning?

To say the BMW M4 CS is a hot ticket in Australia is something of an understatement.

Consider this. There is an even more expensive one, the M4 CS Edition VR46 – at a cool $346,900 – and it sold out in less than an hour. Now, granted, Australia only got four examples, but still, demand was running hot.

That car makes this one, the regular M4 CS, seem like an absolute steal. It's only $254,900 (yes, the word 'only' is doing a lot of heavy lifting in that sentence), and it shares the same upgrades, and makes the same monstrous power, as the VR46 – for Valentino Rossi’s 46th birthday – only it does it for around $100K less.

See? A bargain. At least, that's how I'd be justifying it to myself if I had a quarter of a million burning a hole in my pocket.

So, this or a Porsche 911? Read on.