Settle, dude. Just effing with ya. Tell ya what I did. One of the first things I did when I got my Civic was buy a cheap ebay CAI. Why? Well, was my first foray into "modifying" a car, so I thought that's what everyone was supposed to do. Sure sounded better (to me at least) and was no longer pulling air from in front of a hot exhaust manifold. After about a year, I realized that putting a metal intake tube in a hot engine bay MIGHT not be the best idea, so I wrapped it in thermo wrap to keep it from getting heat soaked.
After another year and almost hydro locking the motor when I drove thru a flooded street, decided to go back to an ALMOST stock intake (drop in K&N filter in the stock box, stock tube, but deleted the resonator except for very short tube into the bottom of the airbox)
Bottom line is that I wouldn't choose either CAI OR short ram. BUT, if you only gave me those 2 choices, would say CAI. At least getting fresher/cooler air, which is the whole point. And composite instead of metal, so less heat transferance. Not really much of a performance gain anyway, particularly on a stock engine.
