The six-speed gearbox, a fortified version of that found in the 540i, shifts with tight precision, having a relatively short throw. And sixth gear is not too tall, so you still have torque to accelerate without downshifting at 60 mph. The throttle blip during heel-and-toe downshifts was responsive, but we didn't find the pedals perfectly matching our feet and legs.
The brakes are magic, flawless, breaking a barrier for power, consist-ency and easy control during hard usage. We were so dazzled that we forgot to test the ABS-like, the brakes are so good that the notion of a "panic" stop never occurred to us. The front rotors are 13.6 inches and the rear 12.9, which says most of it. We did have one small problem, having reached unprecedented ground: when braking from high speed, stunningly deep for a second-gear turn, there was so much forward momentum on our body that if the road was bumpy our right foot was forced hard against the brake pedal, making things less smooth than desired. We needed racing seatbelts to pin our shoulders back.

Point and shoot is an expression that usually refers to a car that doesn't corner, but it rings true for the M5 because you can point it through a corner. It has such solid grip that the car confidently shoots around corners, not merely away from them; you don't have to wait for the apex to floor it. There is a Sport mode, which tightens the recirculating ball steering (and quickens the throttle responsive), making the car feel somewhat heavy at slow speeds, but the "M Servotronic" speed-sensitive power steering is seamless; you don't realize it's there, but the faster you go the lighter the M5 feels.
Performance, performance, performance is what you hear about the M5, but its most amazing quality is the ride. The suspension is MacPherson struts in front, multi-link in rear, using aluminum components, with new meaning brought to the words "fine tuning." Somehow, brilliant BMW engineers have created this magnificent handling without compromising the comfort and smoothness of the ride, not one iota, not in one single situation. Even those humongous low-profile tires don't cause it to jar or bite - okay, maybe over railroad tracks at 5 mph. But there's no jolt over freeway expansion strips, no wandering over changing surfaces, and no tug on the wheel in rain grooves. If a ride this civilized in a 400-horsepower car with such grip is not unbelievable, it certainly is unprecedented.

We saved the complex feature, the Dynamic Stability Control (DSC), both amazing and problematic, for last. The problem is it works too well, or rather too much. However, it's important to say that the problem can be solved with one finger: so push a button and turn it off, if you don't want it. And we're talking here only about driving really hard on dry pavement. We didn't have the opportunity to test the DSC in the wet, which is where it could be a lifesaver, and what it's all about. Complicating our issue is that it was only the traction control, not the directional control, that got in the way. But BMW's DSC integrates everything: ABS, traction control and stability (directional) control. Its sophistication level is state of the art, with wheel sensors that measure not only minute slippage, but lateral acceleration (how hard the vehicle is cornering) and yaw (rotation around the car's vertical axis).
Technically, we can't say what the car's committee of ECU chips was concluding. All we knew was that under hard acceleration or aggressive cornering, the traction control kept activating. It might have been simply because it's super sensitive - way too sensitive. Minute wheelspin happens long before you can feel it or it has any effect on control, and if you want to program a computer to stop it, you can, but that doesn't improve the driving experience. We're talking about a loss of spark and/or application of brakes at 60 mph on dry pavement while upshifting aggressively to third gear. And while cornering hard - but well below the point of sliding-under steady throttle in second gear, if there are light bumps in the road. It feels like a misfire, and it's annoying to have your head lurch forward when the car stops accelerating in these situations. Of course, it might be said that DSC works like a training tool to force you to apply the throttle gently.

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In reading BMW's excellent explanation of DSC, the words "normal" and "should" appear a lot. There's the rub, we think. It's not a computer problem, it's that a human being decides what is "normal" and what the car "should" be doing, and then programs the sensitivity of traction control within the DSC. That human being isn't behind the wheel on your road on your day.