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The new Audi A8 incorporates innovative new tech features, along with LED headlights.

(Credit: Audi)

2011 Audi A8 preview (photos)

In case the automotive press was in any doubt about Audi's message for its new A8 sedan, the company chose to launch the latest iteration of its flagship model at this year's Design Miami art festival in Miami Beach. The third generation of the A8 does deserve some credit for its new design language: its clean side profile and squat front end chime with many of the cues we've seen on other updated models in the automaker's lineup. Audi has a thing for lights recently, and the A8's LEDs got plenty of airtime at the launch ceremony, with British designer Tom Dixon crooning over the car's "anti-gravity luminosity." We're not quite sure what that is, but any headlight assembly that packs in more than 40 LEDs on each corner has to be something special.

In the cabin, Audi's new luxobarge offers the usual lineup of entertainment and information systems with a few head-turning features, including an optional handwriting recognition system for navigation inputs, an updated MMI interface, and an optional 1,400-watt Bang and Olufsen audio system. Other notable innovations include an intelligent link between the car's navigation system and other onboard systems, including the adaptive cruise control, gearbox, and--of course--the headlights. Check out the photos to see the latest that Ingolstadt has to offer.

The combined Land Rover/Jaguar company, now owned by Indian automaker Tata, had a little fun for the holidays, coming up with concept images for Santa's sleigh, one designed by Jaguar, and the other by Land Rover.

(Credit: Jaguar)

(Credit: Land Rover)

Land Rover went futuristic with its land-based speeder design. Being a Land Rover, we assume it handles rough terrain well. It also looks like the cockpit is designed for a reindeer driver, which must require some very special controls.

This TomTom Car Kit for iPhone uses the EasyPort suction cup windshield mount.

(Credit: Antuan Goodwin/CNET)

Any automotive GPS device worth its salt will come packaged with some sort of suction cup mount that will allow users to stick their unit to their vehicle's windshield. For most users, this is where road ends where GPS device mounting is concerned. But is this the best way to keep your navigation device in place while you drive? And what about that weird plastic disk that was also in the box? Let's take a look at the pros and cons of the different GPS mounting options.

Pay attention, because what you learn here can also be applied to mounting your GPS-enabled smartphone.

A video signal is delivered from the camera mounted in the head of the truck to the back door panels through a projector.

(Credit: Art Lebedev)

Russian design studio Art Lebedev calls this simple invention--a camera that takes images from the front of a truck to show it on screens in the back--Transparentius. I call it geeneeuzz.

I don't know why the drawing below shows a tank at the front of the truck, but I guess that in Russia people drive T-90s like people drive Fords in the U.S. I wish the technology was so cheap that this could be implemented for real, because I'm sure being able to see what's in the blind zone before switching lanes would save a lot of lives on the road.

(Credit: Art Lebedev)

This story originally appeared on Gizmodo.

(Credit: Magellan)

Following the launch of its turn-by-turn navigation app for iPhone, Magellan has released its Premium Car Kit for iPhone and iPod Touch. The Premium Car Kit features an amplified speaker for spoken directions, a Bluetooth speakerphone for hands-free calling, a built-in GPS receiver that should improve positioning compared with the iPhone 3G's built-in GPS as well as adds GPS positioning to first-generation iPhones and the iPod Touches.

The mount lets you rotate the iPhone to portrait and landscape views, and has a built-in charger. Essentially, it will behave exactly like TomTom's Car Kit; however, the Magellan kit has an adjusting arm that will let it accommodate an iPhone or iPod Touch with a protective case.

The Magellan Premium Car Kit will cost $129.99. When TomTom's kit debuted for slightly less than that price, it was universally regarded as too expensive, so we can already guess what sort of reception Magellan's kit will get.

Magellan's Premium Car Kit for iPhone is available now for preorder.

The Need for Speed series returns to the iPhone with NFS:Shift.

(Credit: Screenshot by Antuan Goodwin/CNET)

Need for Speed SHIFT for iPhone (photos)

EA Mobile has released the second iPhone game in the Need for Speed series: Need for Speed Shift.

You may remember that we took a look at Need for Speed Undercover not too long ago and found it was a fun, arcadelike take on racing with a decent number of fully customizable vehicles. Shift is an evolution of that game but with more realistic racing physics in place of the hokey storyline. Also new to Shift are customizable racing views. Users can now select between chase-cam, hood-cam, bumper-cam, and cockpit views. The cockpit view is unique to the vehicle you're driving, but unfortunately there are no working gauges. The cockpit view is also the only view that features damage modeling in the form of a windshield that gets more messed up the as you hit things.

This Nissan Z features an accurate interior, but no working gauges.

(Credit: Screenshot by Antuan Goodwin/CNET)

On your first outing with Shift, you'll be treated to a quick tutorial that teaches you how to drive with an iPhone. Shift pretty much plays like Undercover, but with a few key differences. Its steering is still controlled by tilting. The vehicles still auto-accelerate and brake when the screen is tapped. However, the race-breaker, slow-motion feature is gone and the controls are supposedly more realistic. In practice, this means that you can no longer win races without touching the brakes and that the transmission is now manual, which can be frustrating for novice users who just want to drive.

Fortunately, there are driver aids that can be activated that automatically brake and shift for you and assist steering that make your ham-fisted inputs smoother and more accurate. Users who want an easy to play, arcade-style racer can turn on the driving aids and win a few medals on the bus ride to work; and users who want more of a racing-sim experience can set all systems to manual for more control over the game. Driving aids or not, drifting is maddeningly difficult this time around. I prefer the drifting mechanics of Undercover.

The Bentley Continental Supersports is the fastest car Bentley makes.

(Credit: Josh Miller/CNET)

2010 Bentley Continental Supersports (photos)

OK, we are going to get something out of the way from the beginning. The 2010 Bentley Continental Supersports may be the most extreme example of sport luxury available today, putting mere BMWs to shame, but its navigation system is terrible. The maps are very low resolution and, stored on a DVD, are slow to refresh and calculate routes. This navigation system lacks all but the most basic features, with no external data feeds or text to speech. It really doesn't belong in this car.

Let that rest as our main criticism so we can get to the good stuff, which is just about everything else.

Bentley has offered several variations of its Continental coupe since its introduction in 2003, but the Supersports model exhibits the purest level of performance. Bentley tweaked the already massive engine for more power, fitted wheels with big carbon ceramic brakes, and shed 243 pounds of weight, most notably by removing the rear seat.

And you really don't want a rear seat in this car, as you would resent any passengers back there for being a drag on performance, while they would unfriend you on Facebook for being relegated to such cramped quarters.

With its coupe design, the Bentley Continental Supersports cuts a nice profile.

(Credit: Josh Miller/CNET)

We were actually a little surprised at the manageable size of this car, making it easy to maneuver through parking garages and dense urban streets. Despite its smallish size, the body is a head-turner, with external lighting nicely molded into the body and the signature wire Bentley grille. The glossy black 20-inch wheels added to this car's unique look.

Of course, the engine also announces the Continental Supersports arrival with a throaty roar. When we pushed the start button, the engine's 12 cylinders began to pump, air was forced into the manifold from twin turbos, and 6 liters of displacement hosted precisely timed explosions that turned the driveshaft with 621 horsepower and 590 pound-feet of torque.

This kind of power means you can lightly tap the gas pedal and find yourself far ahead of the pack of traffic sitting back there at the light, the drivers just putting their cell phones down so they can get back to the business of driving. Put the gas down a little harder and you push up to freeway speeds, the car showing very little effort. Introduce the pedal to the floor and you've begun a career in amateur rocketry.

(Credit: Josh Miller/CNET)

BMW's X6 is a bit difficult to digest, a coupelike body with the proportions and stance of an SUV, managing to lose the virtues of both types of vehicles. And now BMW has given it the M treatment, putting a massively powerful engine under the hood and fitting the suspension with all sorts of ingenious gear to make this vehicle handle like a sports car. Its greatest asset may be that it defies easy categorization.

Cabin tech is good, with really beautiful maps in the navigation system, but we do think that a $90,000 car should have an iPod connection as standard. The X5 M offers the same tech as the X6 M, yet has practical interior space, making it the more obvious choice. But then again, BMW's M cars have never been about practicality.

Read our review of the 2010 BMW X6 M.

(Credit: Ford)

Ford has been working with a tactile robot arm to evaluate the feel and appearance of surfaces and controls in its vehicles in a bid to make the testing process less subjective and more scientific.

The Robotized Unit for Tactility and Haptics, or RUTH, has been used for several years at the automaker's European Research Center in Aachen, Germany, to check the interiors of the European versions of the new Focus and Fiesta, versions of which are coming to the United States in 2010.

Ford says it's the first carmaker to use a robot like RUTH, which is a modified consumer packaging arm, to scientifically test interiors. Work by the machine is now being seen in production models around the world.

To better respond to customer expectations for quality interiors, RUTH measures parameters such as roughness and temperature on points like the steering wheel, knobs and armrests.

RUTH doesn't have a driver's license yet, but it can manipulate knobs and adjust air vents in design prototypes just like a human driver. The data it collects is used by engineers to ensure controls have the right tactile resistance, firmness, uniformity and other qualities.

By using a machine, Ford can assign specific values to qualities, such as "soft," when designing interiors. Research generated by RUTH is also being used to create vehicles with a consistent look and feel.