Brake pads Akebono or Carbotech

Put a set on my last E38 and immediately stopped the blackening of the wheels, while still delivering excellent stopping power. You do give up a tiny bit of initial bite, but they are still quite progressive and predictable, which is just as important.

good pad, virtually no dust, for compariso, had a set of EBC red stuff didn't notice much of the difference when swapped to Ake. Differently recommended for DD use.

Loved them on my Accord. The OEM stuff on the Accord sucked.

They are the OE pads on my Kiz, nice bite, zero fade and low dust.

Good pads.

The Akebono ceramic pads give off a low-visibility tan dust...but on occasion, I miss the grip of the stock pads. Was definitely a worthwhile tradeoff though: Much less to no dust for a barely perceptible reduction in initial bite/grip compared to stock VW brake pads.

Akebono in particular seems to put out an OEM quality pad.

I was running Carbotech Xp12s in the front and XP10s in the rear. That and a good fluid is all it needs, but it's a relatively heavy car so it will take a toll on tires and brakes. Also, MDM (stability control) on the competition pack equipped models allows for quite a bit of of slip (yaw) before intrevening, which is nice whether is a novice driver or just wanting to approach the limit in a safer way. Tires are somewhat pricey especially with the 19" wheels, but not excessively so. A set of PSSs will run around $1400. Oil changes, DIY, are about $150 or so. Spark plugs should be changed at about 20K mile intervals. The only problem I had was a bad evaporator for the A/C which was replaced under warranty (book value on the job is about 9 hours). It's a great daily driver, except for the gas mileage and especially the range. It has a relatively small tank and you'll barely get close to 300 miles per tank. That's the most frustrating bit about it. I do wish it had a slightly bigger tank. The sound is great. It's addictive especially with a nice exhaust system (I highly recommend the M Performance exhaust).

However I have Carbotech brake pads, the 1521's for the street and then for the track day I had XP12 (front) XP10 (rear). Pads are compatible with the rotor, and I had the track pads well bedded in.

I've run the Akebono ceramics on a few cars. They don't have a great initial bite but they do have good stopping power in most conditions. My only note against them is that it can get scary with heavy braking while driving long distances on the highway in sub-40 degree rain - I've had multiple times in two different cars where there's a solid 2 second delay between pressing the pedal hard and them actually biting in those conditions.