You want perfection?

Then never, never give up.

That's pretty much the Porsche story. Here's a whole stable of cars that are about as close to perfect as you'll ever get on four wheels. Yet, they almost always find some little thing, or maybe a whole bunch of little things, to improve the breed.

For 2009, it's the Porsche 911, arguably the most familiar Porsche to people, that gets the treatment.

Four of the 2009 models, including the Carrera S and Carrera coupes and convertibles, will be the recipients of these new features and engines; they also will have a new front end that looks a lot like the legendary 911 Turbo models.

To improve the most important thing about a Porsche 911 -- the performance -- the car gets an all new seven-speed dual clutch manual transmission, a type of gearbox that does away with the clutch pedal and uses paddle shifters instead.

Diehard clutch pedal fans will be surprised to learn that this will shift far more quickly than their much loved six-speed manual cars; and from what I'm told, the performance is absolutely sparkling. There's also two new engines -- a 3.6-liter, 345-horsepower, six-cylinder "boxer" engine, or a larger 3.8-liter, 385-horsepower six. Both engines are faster than the current ones, and get better fuel mileage besides.

Prices start at $76,575. Fuel mileage is expected to be somewhere around 14 to 15 miles per gallon in city driving and 31 to 35 miles per gallon on the highway.