A few general thoughts as I read through this thread:
A general gripe with GM (though not a dealbreaker) is their use of plastic covers everywhere in the engine bay. We've seen under the hood for a while now, but it just really hit me as I spent the entire morning yesterday under the hood of my wife's '04 Taurus wagon doing general maintenance with my father-in-law (he teaches auto-shop at a high school, and since school was out for the holidays we had his shop all to ourselves. Life is good
). Everything was easy to access and only covered if it had to be. Not so with GM cars and it drives me nuts.
I actually like the look of the gauges and radio stack. So I do come from a Cobalt so my standards are low, but I think it looks just fine. Also, Heather, nice choice on the music selection.
I'm excited to finally have XM built in to the radio. I've been without it for a few months as my aftermarket unit no longer sticks to my dash and I have yet to find something that will hold it there short of superglue.
These pics have convinced me to go for the 1SS. In the first pics we saw of cloth interiors the material did not look good, but this stuff looks great and seems to be high quality. That just saved me thousands and means I can get my Camaro a lot sooner! I will miss the 4 pack gauges (well, I'll miss oil temp and pressure, not so much voltage and tranny temps, and I do love the storage space it opens up, so we'll call that a push), the audio controls on the wheel, and the USB port, but I don't use bluetooth (no calls are made while I'm driving, period) and I'm fine with plugging an ipod in through the aux jack and setting a playlist so that's fine.
I'm also debating the merits of the RS package now. $1200 isn't much, but darker wheels and taillamps don't mean much to me. I do like the look of body colored roof ditch moldings and the look and added visibility of the HID headlights, but is it worth the $1200 bucks? Without the RS package I can easily get this car for under $30K after the initial rush dies down. Decisions...
I'm thrilled to see how much the trunk can fit. Unfortunately, just like my Cobalt coupe while the trunk is huge, fitting anything through the opening will be a pain. If we have to haul anything, we'll be taking the wife's wagon.
If the fuel door locks when the doors lock, then I love that method. It would probably take me a while to learn to remember to hit a button on the way out. Pushing it in from the outside to pop it open would be much easier. I just hope it locks with the doors or else I will have to go through the annoyance of a locking gas cap.
Thanks for the updates! This is the best development we've had yet- an SS in the hands of a forum member for a full roadtrip on their own and a play-by-play account. Trust me, if I saw a new Camaro driving down the highway I'd look just like the guy in the SS following.