Sounds like coils to me. I wouldn't even mess with swapping them...I would just replace all four. You can do just 2 and 4 but then you can expect 1 and/or 3 to go soon.
I read up some online and decided to order new ignition coils. Took a few days, but I got four new coils and threw them in. Again, problem solved it seemed. No more EPC light, misfire codes didn't come back and no more rough starts.
I was having hesitation problems a few months ago while accelerating. No CEL, and no codes with VAG-COM. I read here that a lot of other people had had identical problems; the CEL and codes didn't start appearing until well after the symptoms started. Changing the coils solved their problems. So I took the risk and changed all four coils (at about 65,000 miles). That completely solved the problem for me. By the way, the new OEM coils had a completely different part number than the original ones.
So far I've replaced all ignition coils (1 died while I was test driving the car, the other 2 years after in the winter, of course). I decided to replace them all with non-faulty Audi parts instead of doing it every year.
as the op stated, the car sounded completrely different. there was no hesitation, idle changes, vac changes. the car also accelerated a lot smoother as well. it was easier to start from a stop and the engine felt stronger. i didnt believe this at first myself so i threw them on my buddies heavily modded a4 that had an ignition problem between 4-5k rpm and the sound went away with these coils. his car also performed much better as well.
Every wet rain or slushy day, my 97 2.0 would quit or not start at all. Sprayed everything individually and figured it was the ignition coil cause it had hairline fractures. I replaced my ignition coil, but it still gave me troubles.
My wife's 2000 Cabrio started having this same set of symptoms. Replaced coil, plugs, plug wires, cap and rotor not that long ago. Coil was indeed cracked, but the symptoms persist.
Everyone swears the stock coils are great for 800hp because force fed did it. I don't care, the coils suck and always have. I always had random misfires here of there even when new, and I could never run the plug gap I run now with push downs or bolt downs on a stock car even without serious hesitation and enough to increment the misfire counter. This 190k mile Jetta did this also and I thought maybe carbon fouled plugs or a dying coil. Now it pulls 20 inches of vacuum with a rock solid needle at idle no bouncing, no hesitation. The car sounds absolutely different at idle, fresh plugs and a .040 gap, no other change but the coils and fersh plugs. It sounds throatier and crisper with the larger gap too.
Turned out to be bad coil (again).
Yep, guess it's common, but mine just caused a smoking fire under the hood! As mentioned, I just started the car in the a.m. and was backing out of the garage. It started sounding and acting funny as explained and the engine light was blinking.
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