I feel you 100%. I previously drove a 1995 M3 (for ten years straight) and missed out on a few generations of new BMW's, so my introduction to "modern" cars came with my M235i. No doubt the car is quicker, brakes better, has better seats and controls, air conditioning etc. However, no doubt either that to me the car feels "insulated" and "isolated" from the road. The steering has no feel whatsoever, and the car is very hard to see out of (particularly around the wide A pillars and huge exterior mirrors). Bottom line, the car is technically superb and better on paper in every metric over the E36 M3, but it is just not that much fun to drive. I miss my M3 but keeping it perfect was costing me a fortune and smog checks were becoming a very expensive and annoying issue. Time marches on and I'm grateful to have a car at all but I've had the 235i over a year now and my feelings have not changed.
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