Tire recommendations?

I'm a Bridgestone fan, but the Michelins are good also...ride a bit stiffer. No fan of the Pirelli's, as I think they wear faster and cannot out perform the others you mentioned.

I personally put a set of Goodyear Eagle F1 GS-D3 tires on my '97 911 this summer, and absolutely love them. Plenty of grip and great wet traction (for the few times I take it out in the rain.) I'd say the biggest thing I've noticed about them is how quiet they are. I replaced Continental ContiSportContact tires.

I bought the Goodyears from Tire Rack and had them drop shipped to my local performance alignment shop, who installed them, and aligned the car too. My happiness comes from both the tires, and the alignment. But that's just my $0.02 worth.

Car and Driver reviewed maximum performance tires in their December 2005 issue. Here's a link to the article in their webs site.

"Dan Stephenson" wrote

You should pick up a December Car & Driver and read their performance tire test. They didn't like the Pirelli too much, they tested the Potenza RE050A (the S-03 is not really comparable to the others as it's more a race-ready tire rather than a street tire). You should also look at Yoko Advan, ContiSportContact 2, and Goodyear Eagle F1 GS-D3, which along with the Michelin were the top 4.

The Yoko was killer on dry-road performance.

FloydR

All these suggestions of other brands is good and all, but doesn't the "porsche certification" of the SO-2 Bridgestones, Michelin pilot sport SX and Pillerri Pzero rossa mean something?

"Dan Stephenson" wrote

Only the paper it's written on. Would you buy a Mercedes R-Class because it's the "Official Car of the Rolling Stones Tour" just because you're a RS fan?

FloydR

I thought very hard about Porsche's N-specification before I bought new tires. I researched and thought about tires (on and off) for a good 6 months before making a decision. Finally, I decided that if I was driving the car at its limit every day, having N spec tires may be important. But, since I don't drive the car anywhere near its limit very often, I decided that N spec for me was not critical. (I very rarely do anything with this car that is not to Porsche's specification, or above, so this was a very big decision for me.)

So, I finally decided on the Goodyears. It took no more than 15 minutes after I had the new tires on before I was sure that I had made the right decision. I have more confidence in the Goodyear's grip compared to the Continentals that I replaced, plus they are SO much quieter. It was like I got a new car.