From my experience, All Seasons work ok when new for the first winter, they seem to lose traction when they get a little worn. Nothing beats a dedicated snow tire. Studs somewhat follow the all season thing I mentioned.
In our Street Legal ice racing class, we had studded and non studded. The non's proved to be just as fast and more reliable since the studs tended to work loose and lay over and the tires had to be replaced during the season.
i have run 5 or 6 different varieties of modern winter tires, and my all-time favorite for snow is the Dunlop WinterSport 3D. on a car that came with 225/50-16 i ran a 205/55-16 and they worked better than the michelin artic alpin in a minus-one 195/65-15 on the same car. biggest disappointment for winter performance was the michelin pilot alpin, although in their defense they are too wide for the car at 225/45-17 (friend bought for his MS6, i have them on my plain 6)
foxtrapper wrote: Studs are great. On ice. Not on anything else.
Quoted for truth. That said, I ran studs when I lived in Maine, as the roads I drove there often got covered in ice after the snow they never got around to plowing got packed down by traffic. But the rest of the time I couldn't wait to get any non-studded tires back on the car, even the all-seasons my Miata came with.
Whatever you do- DON'T try and fight an MN snowstorm on Potenza RE050As. I made that mistake. We'll leave it at that.
Whatever you pick avoid regroved tires that just have four straight lines in them.
And if you get stuck don't just keep spining your wheels until your car catches fire.
Studs are good for ice, yes.
Modern studded tires are not the liability on wet pavement that people make them out to be, however. I live in Seattle, where the roads are basically wet (not snowy) from, well, now until April, I ski a lot so need snows, and I use studded Altimax tires (we often get wet-ice conditions when driving up/off the nearby mtn. passes). In my experience, they are fine in the wet. European tire test wet pavement braking data I have seen supports this experience. YMMV.
HStockSolo wrote:Javelin wrote: DWS's or actual Snow tires? The DWSs are All-seasons. The Conti Snows are the same price.The DWS are quite good in the snow for an all season, but still about half the traction of a studless winter tire. I'll find the Tirerack link.
The shape of the curves is also interesting. Most all-seasons require very little slip (i.e. traction control.) I haven't gotten to try my DWS in the snow yet, but they have plenty of dry and wet traction. They seem to be out of stock a lot, and going up in price. I used Continental's included road hazard warranty to get a flat replaced, and had to pay a little extra for the replacement.
My Conti DWS have done great in the snow on both a MINI Clubman S and on an IS300. I haven't gotten to the point I needed chains with them yet but I have them just in case. Their grip in the wet is phenomenal.
Dunlop Wintersport 3D or M3, or Blizzak LM 25 or LM 60. All are pretty close in both snow and dry performance (I've used all of them). I run winters from November to March and don't swap tires during that time, so I like a tire that performs like a performance all-season even in the dry, which all of these do. They all have sidewalls that are as stiff as most performance A/S tires, but they're all great in snow and ice. Also fine in dry (and rain) and I drive hard all winter....and high speed rated for long highway trips when it's cold but not necessarily precip.
oh, and my well-used winter photos - not stuck in any of them...
Blizzak LM-25 with FWD lowered car
Wintersport 3D with AWD on a lowered car
foxtrapper wrote: Nothing works well when the snow is a foot deep or more.
see my earlier post 
36° up-hill driveway from a standing start... no wheel spin in 3 different snows last yr... 11, 12, and 14"
wbjones wrote: these : Pacemaker Snow Trackermy Suby has gone anywhere in up to 14" of snow on very steep roads without even any wheel spin... (old Impreza .. no LSD )
A few years ago I went to the Artic Circle in January. None of the cars I looked at, and I made a point to check, had studded tires on them. This was in Finland they all ran dedicated winter tires.
Just my 2 cents.
I just got these from tirebuyer.com.
Studless Nitto NT-SN2. Was a new design a couple of years ago and had some very strong reviews. They were very inexpensive as well. They have a bizillion sipes and are very soft. I'll be happy with 2 seasons, where I have had 3 on Winterforces.
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