Tires Vredestein or GENERAL TIRE

I have General Grabber AT2 on my XC70 ...I also recommend going with 16s, more sidewall means less likely to bend a wheel.

For a budget snow tire I have been using these now for 2 years and love them:

I love my General Grabbers and AT2's. They are a little rough on the street but an awesome tire off-road. The AT2's get stuck in the mud very easily though. I've had the AT2's on my daily for 4 years now with little wear and I drive an average of 14,000 miles a year.

I live in Maine... as you can expect we get plenty of snow/ice. Never needed studded tires unless I was driving on a giant sheet of ice i.e. frozen lake. I run General Altimax Arctics on my 4Motion Passat, about $80/tire in 16" sizes.

check out General Altimax Arctic tires, Im on my 3rd season and they have plenty of life left to them and made my E30 a champ in the snow.

Put my 16" golf oem rims and general artimax tires on last night. So far very happy with the road noise and handling even in 60 degree temps here in NJ.

The only "good" winter tire I have experience with is the General Altimax, which did great and I would recommend highly.

general altimax arctic 215/50 r17 - 2005 Subaru sti - Nebraska winters - such a great tire, i almost wish i could have more fun when I'm our playing in the snow...

I also put on Vredestein tires b/c factory tires were slipping when I punched it from a dead stop.

I have been running Generals for a few years now. The Exclaim UHP was replaced with the G-Max AS-03 a few years back. They have served me well. Longevity is not great, but traction per dollar has been good.