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Originally Posted by Robert
The first point was a general statement on the stigma of 4 cylinder engines associated to economy cars or inferior Japanese imports late 20th century. Most people don't want to pay premium for product with perceived inferiority. As much as this may sound ignorant or illogical, car purchase is most often emotional decision.
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Please note the huge popularity of the Audi A4 which is currently available only with a 4 cylinder engine (at least in the US, and I believe worldwide also). It used to be available with a V6 as well, but so few people chose the V6, despite it offering about 45hp more than the 2.0T, that they got rid of it.
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Second point is that BMW is powering a SUV with only 230hp that weights 3300 unladen, which is lethargic even compared against a lowly Honda v6 Accord.
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It's 245hp actually (perhaps only 240hp in the US). Also, this hardly the lowest power output available in the X1. There are plenty of lower output engines available since launch. It's true that this will be the base (and only) engine in the US, at least for now, but so what? Compared to the other SUVs in this category, they are right in the game. For example, the Acura RDX I mentioned earlier makes 240hp from a 2.3L turbo I4, and it weighs nearly 4000 lbs. The LR2 makes only 230hp from a 3.2L N/A I6. The new Evoque will have a 2L turbo with similar power. Plenty of other similarly-sized SUVs are similarly powered, anywhere from under 200hp up to 275hp or so. I think the BMW will be one of the top performers of all of them.