I struggled with the same decision for my 2002 325i, We've used Bilstein sports for many years but always for sportier cars +/or track use. On the E46 decided to go with Koni Sports (yellow) which are adjustable. Ride is less harsh the Bilsteins, more comfortable and well controlled - no regrets. I also installed H&R sport springs FYI.
I love my Koni active reds, swapped to them from bilstein b8s and won’t look back, smoother ride and 4 years on them they haven’t sagged or blown. I run them on my daily e92.
I installed it on my RF and there are no issues.
I'd consider the KONI STRT if available for the 2012.
Some one already said it but I recently did koni yellows and HR OE sport springs for mine. On the koni "stock ride hight" setting it sits nice and is a very comfortable ride since the HR springs lower it to a classy level without bottoming out ever.
I did koni orange shocks with eibach pro springs - been dailying it for 5 or so years. It sits about 1in lower than stock.
I went with Koni Super active as an "upgrade" from oem and I'm very happy with those.
I have mildly upgraded shocks (koni active) but otherwise stock and the ride quality is pretty good
I've been running them on my MK6 for about 40K miles. I'll never go back to standard shocks and struts. The adaptive dampening is a huge benefit on freeway drives since the expansion joints are completely removed from the ride. They are solid and planted for everyday driving and I've never felt the car was unstable.
I'm running Koni special actives on stock springs with 17" tires. There are a few threads over at https://www.golfmk7.com/forums/index.php where it's pretty much agreed that they are OEM+. I put them in about a year ago and they are still great.
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