hmm, I having trouble with the links and 6speed. not sure what is going on... so far the tires look fine to me. I really think it is the bearing due to the noise the car made with the wheels spinning *off* the ground

 

got my car back today after they changed the front right bearing at the dealer. WOW. The car is SO quiet. I can only hear the engine! I had forgotten what that was like It is just an unbelievable difference. Having never had a bearing fail on me before, I had no idea something like that could create so much white noise at speed. My judgement of the RE050A on the 996 is the same as the Ferrari, very quiet tires. I'd highly recommend them in that regard.

Total parts+labor was $550 which didn't seem too bad. I tried to argue that even though it is not under warranty since it is > 4years old, the car only has 20K miles and the failure started while under warranty, but they were not at all sympathetic. I have better things to do than to argue with these guys and I'm so thrilled my car is fixed, but still, I've owned over 10 new cars in the past 17 years, and the 996 is the only one that had this problem.