English: What make [did you choose]/[have you chosen]?

[AvidLearner#]

Context:

Suppose A and B haven't seen each other for a long time. They bump into each other on the street and have the following conversation:

Dialog #1:

A: "Hi! Long time no see! How are you? What's new with you?"
B: "I'm fine! I'm buying a new car tomorrow."
A: "Really? What make have you chosen?"
B: "I've chosen a BMW because I did some research and found that it offers the best balance of performance, reliability, and luxury features for budget."

Dialog #2:

A: "Hi! Long time no see! How are you? What's new with you?"
B: "I'm fine! I bought a new car!"
A: "Really? What make did you choose?"
B: "I chose a BMW because I'd done/I did some research and found that it offered the best balance of performance, reliability, and luxury features for my budget."

Question:

Are the bolded tenses used correctly in the above two dialogs? Regarding the "I'd done/I did" part in the second dialog, either tense is fine, right? Thank you.

[Deinonysus]

With all due respect, if your last 10 threads about the perfect in English didn't help you figure out these distinctions, this one won't either. What do you think is correct based on your own intuition as well as the answers to all the previous threads you've created about this same topic?

[luke]

I'd use "I did some research" in both cases.

For me, "I'd done some research" might get used if the other voice had said something like, "you told me BMWs were too expensive" and the speaker wanted to to say he'd completed some research (about cost of ownership) that changed his mind (which is contradictory to the reasons the guy offered), but make the "I'd done" change of tense merit worthy.

You can play with it in your own mind. I hadn't read the other 10 threads.

[AvidLearner#]

With all due respect, if your last 10 threads about the perfect in English didn't help you figure out these distinctions, this one won't either. What do you think is correct based on your own intuition as well as the answers to all the previous threads you've created about this same topic?

Based on my intuition, I think the tenses I used are all correct. Well, I thought they were all correct until Luke pointed out that "I'd done" doesn't work in the second dialog. Other than that, I think everything else is correct.

[Deinonysus]

With all due respect, if your last 10 threads about the perfect in English didn't help you figure out these distinctions, this one won't either. What do you think is correct based on your own intuition as well as the answers to all the previous threads you've created about this same topic?

Based on my intuition, I think the tenses I used are all correct. Well, I thought they were all correct until Luke pointed out that "I'd done" doesn't work in the second dialog. Other than that, I think everything else is correct.

I actually like your original version, under the analysis that "I'd done some research" is in relation to the choosing, not the finding. But Luke's version is fine as well.

I hereby declare that you have mastered the perfect in English and can generally trust your own instincts in these matters.

[Cainntear]

As I've tried to say on a couple of occasions, the focus on the tense kind of disregards the problem of other non-native things which most people are not going to consciously pick up on, but that will throw them off balance, and ruin the ability to get a natural response from them.

Specifically, the problem here is that regardless of tense, "what make [did you choose]/[have you chosen]?" is just a very odd question. What role does it play? What information is B trying to get out of A?

One of the problems when you get good at a language is that this is the type of error you're more likely to make -- not something technically incorrect, but just something very unusual. A lot of this is about "markedness" as described in Myers-Scotton's markedness model. There are certain things we expect in certain situations and contexts; if a sentence deviates from the expectation without breaking any rules, we are likely to infer extra meaning from that. A reader might not even be aware they're doing it, but because you've deviated from expectation, native-speaker intuition is broken -- the native-speaker is in a situation where they don't have any expectation.

[AvidLearner#]

Dialog #1:

B: "I'm buying a new car tomorrow."
A: "Really? What make [have you decided to buy]/[have you gone with]?"
B: "[I've decided to buy]/[I've gone with] a BMW because I did some research and found..."

Dialog #2:

B: "I bought a new car!"
A: "Really? What make [did you decide to buy]/[did you go with]?"
B: "[I decided to buy]/[I went with] a BMW because I did some research..."

Question:

Instead of using the verb "choose" (as in the opening post), can the bolded options I've written above be used in dialogs #1 and #2. Do they sound OK to you? Thank you.

[AvidLearner#]

Specifically, the problem here is that regardless of tense, "what make [did you choose]/[have you chosen]?" is just a very odd question. What role does it play? What information is B trying to get out of A?

In dialog #1, A wants to know what make B is going to buy tomorrow. In dialog #2, A wants to know what make B bought in the past. Of course, to avoid the tense issue, that line can be simplified in both cases to plain "What make?", but that's another thing.

Why do you think asking for that information is non-native and will throw native speakers off balance? What would a native speaker expect to hear instead of what I wrote? Thanks.

[luke]

Dialog #1:

B: "I'm buying a new car tomorrow."
A: "Really? What [have you decided to buy]/[have you gone with]?"
B: "[I've decided to buy]/[I've gone with] a BMW because I did some research and found..."

Dialog #2:

B: "I bought a new car!"
A: "Really? What make [did you decide to buy]/[did you go with]?"
B: "[I decided to buy]/[I went with] a BMW because I did some research..."

Question:

Instead of using the verb "choose" (as in the opening post), can the bolded options I've written above be used in dialogs #1 and #2. Do they sound OK to you? Thank you.

There is OK, which means fine, not wrong.

They are fine.

There's also the thing of register (formality). For me, telling someone I'm buying or have bought a new car would generally occur with someone I'm feeling close to, a friend, family. That being the case, I'd use an informal register.

With informality in mind, here's what I might say:

B: "I'm buying a new car tomorrow."
A: "Really? What make[did you decide on]/[are you going with]?"
B: "[I'm getting]/[I'm going with] a BMW because I did some research and found..."

Dialog #2:

B: "I bought a new car!"
A: "Really? What make[did you buy]/[did you go with]?"
B: "[i]I got/[I went with] a BMW because I did some research..."

So, again, you're answer is perfectly fine. I used colors in the less formal alternatives to show that "go with/went with" are comfortable together, as the B person is using a quite similar construction as the A person. Similarly, "buying/getting" and "bought/got" have a consistent tense and switch the verb which can be quite natural and is focusing on the "I've got the car now", which is the exciting news, rather than, "I've spent the dough", which may include some regret, even with your great research.

Your example is a little more fancy-pants register. If that's the circle your running in, it is perfectly fine, and in fact better than my less formal solutions.

You seem to be doing great, so I wouldn't sweat it.