PROTON SAVVY 1.2 Style 5dr (2005)

Proton Savvy - Dunno what the bad rep is about, good cheap car, touch wood...

I saw the other review of the Proton Savvy on here and thought I should defend it! I know cars have very different lives that can give one of them trouble and another none at all, so who knows what happened with that one. All I can say is that my Savvy has been just fine really. I've had it just over three years, bough second hand at about 30k, and all it's had go wrong was a little thing with the remote locking, and some warning lights playing up. Both were fixed without hassle by the dealer (came within the 12 month warrant they gave me) and overall the dealer was otherwise extremely helpful and genuine.

I mean it's not a luxury car. The doors feel a little bit flimsy and it's not all that quiet, nor is it designed for motorway driving where it can sometimes feel a bit out of its depth when being overtaken closely by a lorry or going too much over the speed limit, but for a little runaround that just sips fuel and doesn't give you too many problems, then you could do a lot worse really. It's such a cheap car up front as well, even if there were a few problems down the line it wouldn't be a disaster.

One down side is that the Proton Savvy has only got two seats in the back, no space for a fifth passenger. That seems a bit odd, it looks like you could squeeze someone in there, if only a child, but there's no space or belt, so four it is. That hasn't been too much of an issue for us, and I reckon we'll keep it if we have kids - to begin with at least - but if you need to carry more than four round at any point then that's something to consider.

There are a few safety features that impressed me for such a small cheap car, like ABS brakes and the airbags too. Thankfully we haven't tested those! Good to know we've got them though. Air con is a massive plus too. In other ways it gives away its budgetness, like with the wing mirrors that only adjust manually, and the interior that generally feels a bit cheap (not falling apart at all though). It depends what you're looking for in a car really, economy or gadgets.

Also, from the outside it looks pretty good as it goes! We used to have a Micra and I can definitely say I get fewer stupid kids laughing at me driving this.