We're with ya Rufous, except that our house is 20+ years old now.
We used the best cedar lap siding we could get at the time[locally].
We're looking to replace the 'sunny' side with either fake stone or maybe Hardie board.
We're going to do something above the porch roof, left of the porch and the bedroom[far left] and leave the remainder as is[cedar].
This is the fake rock rock we used both inside and out.
This is what the rest[non-sunbaked] looks like and I refuse to tear it off.