I was wondering which would be better in terms of performance and as a platform to upgrade in the future. I don't really have any specific horsepower goals just the desire to go turbo at some point in the future. So what would be the advantages or disadvantages of one over the other.

I am not really worried about which one would be easier I am up for the challenge.

 

I've done both and suggest the swap instead of making a non turbo tubo.

Non turbo with a turbo on it killed most of any low end torque on my car. Car ran fine over three grand but drivability sucks at stop lights and neighborhood driving.

That said BUMPSTART saved me from chunking the non turbo to turbo car. He suggested running a vacuum line to the throttle bodys double throttle diaphram with no water thermovalve inbetween. This keeps the outter set of secondary throttle plates fully closed til you get on it in a manner of speaking. In a twisted way it emulates the aux port actuators imho. In other words this dramatically improves torque at stop lights and city type driving. Made that car driveable again.

I had no such problems with another car I have that I put a series four turbo into with transmission (was originally a non turbo). That is my favorite car. I like that car better than the stk factory turboII.

 

hmm ive had both as well id probably sugest the real t2 swap.

the na-t only seems to be a better route if you have a good condition na motor and all the t2 parts laying around, but no t2 motors. ( the position i was in)

t2 motor would be more robust for higher boost applications with its lower compression ratio, making tuning easier.

t2 motor- more reliabile in theory
na motor- easy to find , dirt cheap

 

its simpler and imo cheaper just to dump in a jspec then baby/store it around until you get the proper electronics.