To be honest, I'm more interested in the sound.
Power gain or loss will be negligible anyway and won't really make any difference in the real world.
Interesting that most tuners recommend an intake as part of stage 2 hardware though.
There's a thread somewhere covering the real need for an aftermarket intake on stage 2, or whether the standard intake does the job. Opinion was divided. I'd bet the real gains come from the downpipe and cat.
But yeah, without sending this thread off on a tangent, I'm kind of with you - in that while I wouldn't call the peak gains of an aftermarket intake negligable, I'd question just how essential they are for stage 2 maps.
If you're buying for the noise then there's nothing wrong with that. I think a lot of us have grown up hearing Cossies, Evos and the like, hissing and chattering up the road, and I'd be lying if I said I didn't think 'wow!!!!' at the time!