The 1.5 isn't a bad motor. The CVT is the biggest drawback of it, my wife had an ex-l with it so I've been there. I had it in a civic Si with the manual and it was great. The 2.0t is a great platform and I know the guys with the true 10 speed auto love it. I went manual when one came up because its just what I've always loved to drive. Don't let people scare you away from tuning yours with the "cvt can't handle it" stuff. There are a lot of guys over on civicx.com running tuned 1.5/cvt's with a lot of success.