[rkw]

The June issue of Consumer Reports has a comparison of convertibles. They divided convertibles into two groups. The "sporty retro with manual shift" group included the Mini Cooper S, VW New Beetle GLS, and PT Cruiser GT. The "mid-size cruiser with automatic" group included Toyota Camry Solara, Ford Mustang, and Chrysler Sebring.

In the road test ratings for the sporty group, CR declared "the Mini was the clear winner". The Beetle came in second and the PT Cruiser third. However, of the three, CR finds only the PT Cruiser to have acceptable reliability. "Of the six cars here we can recommend only the Chrysler PT Cruiser among the sporty group and the Toyota Camry Solara among the larger convertibles. We can’t recommend the Mini Cooper S and Volkswagen New Beetle because of subpar reliability. The Chrysler Sebring scored too low in our tests and has subpar reliability. The Ford Mustang is too new to have a reliability record."

A few interesting things I noticed in the specs and tests of the cars:
The PT Cruiser has a turbo 220hp engine and better 0-60 and 45-65 acceleration times than the MCSC, but CR said it feels sluggish around town at lower speeds. The Beetle is nearly 400 pounds heavier than the Mini, and the PT Cruiser 550 pounds heavier. The Beetle is 17 inches longer than the Mini, but its wheelbase is only 2 inches longer.

One parameter that CR evaluated and I haven't seen much discussion here is the amount of noise with the soft-top up -- amount of wind noise and ability to block traffic noises. The Mini fared poorly in comparison to the others in this issue.