I thought about buying one a while back when they first came out (2004ish I think). At the time the AWD wasn’t even released yet. I drove a T5 FWD with manual. Motor was pretty decent, quite torquey off idle. And that was about it… Car just felt way too small and cramped (based on Mazda 3 and Euro Ford Focus platform). The manual tranny was very notchy. Also had way too much suspension and road noise for a $30k+ car. Walked out of the dealer disappointed, went and drove a Mazda 6 later that day and thought (aside from engine and lack of AWD) it was hands down a nicer car (which was also almost $6k less.