I'm not quite old enough to earn a living writing about the great cars of yesteryear I drove in my motoring-journalism youth. I haven't yet racked up sufficient decades to be able to sink back in a leather armchair, large glass of port in hand and utter the lines: "Of course, my boy, I was on the launch of the original Mini, you know."

But I'm getting there all the same. Just the other evening I was thinking about the first time I drove a BMW, almost ten years ago now. It was a 3-Series, not the one before the model you see photographed, but the one before that. It was summer and there'd just been a light shower when the photographer asked me to drive for some cornering shots. First time around, the thing went almost completely sideways. It scared the living daylights out of me, but somehow I managed to catch it, and from that moment on I loved it. Compared with everything else that was around then, it just felt so far ahead of its time and exciting.

Now I've got the keys to another 3-Series in my hand and what do you know, it's raining again. It's a long, boring, slow haul out of town, but that's not a problem, because this £22,645 320d SE feels like a limousine inside, especially compared with the spartan interior of that first 3-Series. The seats are excellent while the dashboard is very up-market and perfectly laid out. Standard equipment includes six airbags, anti-lock brakes, automatic stability control, automatic traction control, cornering brake control and automatic aircon. Meanwhile, the options list offers a navigation system, television with Teletext and a tyre-pressure control system.

The engine is a four-cylinder diesel. It's a 16-valve, intercooled turbo unit that knocks 136bhp and 206lb ft of torque - apparently giving it the highest specific output of any diesel car. If you drive in a sensible fashion there's a possible 49.6mpg on offer. But it won't give that good economy if you try and crack the claimed 0-62mph time of 9.9 seconds. The engine does need revving hard to get up to motorway speeds, but once there it cruises happily; quiet and comfortable - just like a mini 5-Series.

So, it's near perfect then? No, I'm afraid not, not if you actually want to have some driving fun. I took a different route home - one I haven't used for couple of years. It used to be the perfect challenging route for a car like a 3-Series and the 3-Series used to be a perfect car for the route. But I'm afraid both have now changed.

Ultra-comfortable though the 320d's high-tech chassis may be, there's a laziness in the steering that wasn't there before. Where even the base models used to dart eagerly into corners, this one swings in with a reluctant wallow. The old car seemed to encourage enthusiastic driving, this one just lulls you into easing off and almost allowing the car to drive itself.

It was all for the best anyway, because that once fine road is now strewn with Gatsos. Perhaps its just BMW being ahead of the game once again. Except that this time, it's not so exciting

Angus Frazer

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