(Credit:
The Press Democrat)
When it comes to speed radars, why should police officers have all the fun? Santa Rosa, CA-based Pocket Radar, Inc. has engineered a palm-sized speed radar for those curious about the speed of moving objects.
Tattletales might enjoy aiming the device at motorists or speeding cops, but Pocket Radar is intended for more serious applications.
In an interview with the Press Democrat, co-founder Steve Goody explains that it can also be used by hockey, bike racing, horse racing, and soccer fans. "It has an application for any sport with a moving object," he said.
Steve Goody, Chris Stewart, and Grant Moulton spent four years building the product which will release in spring 2010. The three founders are Silicon Valley veterans who hail from companies like HP, Cisco Systems, and Agilent Technologies.
At $199-249, it's likely only die-hard fans will purchase the radar. However, athletic trainers might find it useful in training, as a prototype is already used by a local baseball coach.
In line with its safety focus, Volvo is pioneering some very cool electronic-driver-aid technology. The 2010 Volvo XC60 can be had with lane departure warning, following-distance warning, and blind-spot detection. But while these safety gadgets are optional, Volvo takes the impressive step of making its City Safety feature standard. This feature automatically jams on the brakes when it detects an imminent low-speed collision, which should make insurance companies happy.
(Credit:
Corinne Schulze/CNET)
BMW must hate us. The new 7-series came in with so much tech, we had to work long days to evaluate it all. Of course, a long day spent driving the 750Li over and around mountains wasn't exactly a painful experience. But then there was the time spent trying out the navigation system with its traffic avoidance feature, or activating night vision and seeing how the pedestrian detection works, not to mention trying out the lane departure warning, adaptive cruise control, parking system, side-view cameras, phone system, stereo, and the list goes on. Fortunately, this is a new update for the 7-series, so we won't have to work this hard until the next update.
(Credit:
Corinne Schulze/CNET)
Currently, Infiniti offers some of the best cabin tech in the automotive world, and the 2009 Infiniti G37 Sedan exemplifies a balance of modern convenience and sport driving prowess. Although we recently reviewed the 2009 Infiniti G37 Coupe with all-wheel-drive, we took a look at the G37 Sedan to test out Infiniti's new adaptive cruise control system.
Where the Coupe shows off a sports car look with its quick drop from the roof line towards the trunk, the Sedan has that bubble design for the cabin common among modern cars. Of course, the extra doors and higher roof mean a much more usable back seat and make the car useful as a family hauler for the driver who also wants some power.
Cabin tech between the Sedan and Coupe is identical, with both featuring a hard drive-based navigation system that operates quickly and shows live traffic. The navigation system also does text-to-speech, reading out the names of upcoming streets.
The G37's navigation system points out bad traffic areas.
(Credit: Corinne Schulze/CNET)The audio system has a ridiculous number of digital audio sources, too, which includes iPod integration, satellite radio, a Compact Flash slot, auxiliary in, MP3-capable CD player, and the ability to rip CDs to the car's own hard drive. The audio quality is very good with the premium sound system, although not the best we've heard.
The Bluetooth system in these cars is also pretty good, although we ran into a problem due to the fact that you have to push contacts from a paired cell phone to the car. Our paired iPhone lacked the capability to populate the car's phone book in that manner, so we would have had to make entries manually.
For cabin tech, the Lincoln MKS edges out the G37 Sedan slightly, due to the excellent capabilities of Ford Sync and the THX sound system, but the G37 has the edge in performance.
You can feel the power surge when you hit the gas pedal, tapping the 328 horsepower from the 3.7-liter V-6 engine. The G37 has responsive acceleration, along a new seven-speed automatic transmission. The Sport mode on this transmission shifts properly when you drive aggressively. If you go at moderate speed into a turn and give it a little brake, the transmission assumes you aren't serious and stays in its current gear. It's only when you hammer the throttle until the last minute, then use heavy braking, that the transmission kicks down, giving good power to accelerate out of the turn.
Infiniti's steering column-mounted paddle shifters show the car means business. Getting into manual mode and using the paddles, we found that downshifts were pleasingly fast, but upshifts seemed much slower, which could have just been the car's way of saying it wanted to stay in the heavy power band, economy be damned.
Dynamic cruise control information displays on the instrument panel.
(Credit: CNET)The new feature, adaptive cruise control, is more suited to those long freeway trips with moderate to light traffic. Set the car's speed at 80 mph, then watch as it slows down for slower traffic ahead. Don't worry, it will slow down. With the following distance set at its shortest among the three options, we were on the edge of the seat as the car sped towards a slower car up ahead. Under these circumstances, the car hit its brakes surprisingly hard before matching speed with the slowpoke in our lane.
Passing cars with this cruise control system can be a little scary, depending on conditions. We moved a lane to the left, and the G37 took a moment to decide it was okay to get up to speed, a good safety feature, but bad if someone is coming up fast in the lane you just moved into. When it decided the lane was clear, the G37 roared up to our set speed.
The 2009 Infiniti G37 Sedan makes an excellent all-around car. You get the practicality of four doors and useful cabin electronics, but you can also stretch its legs out on winding mountain roads. At our test car's $43,288 price tag, it doesn't seem like a budget automobile, but when compared to competitors from BMW and Mercedes-Benz, it starts to look like a bargain.
(Credit:
Corinne Schulze/CNET)
Cobra comes up with a new concept for radar detectors--GPS that warns you of existing driving hazards. Along with its 15-band detection, Cobra's XRS 9960G correlates your current location with a database of known red-light and speed cameras, as well as potentially hazardous driving areas. In our testing, we found the system works perfectly, although its alerts come a little too frequently, especially in an urban area like San Francisco, which has plenty of red-light cameras.
Although a car crash perks up everyone's attention, we got to experience the opposite in the noncrashing Volvo XC60. The folks at Volvo want everyone to know about the XC60's new City Safety feature, and they are hosting demonstrations around the country.
The XC60 stops itself a few feet short of the pylons.
(Credit: CBS Interactive)We stopped by one of the demonstrations locations, a Volvo dealership in San Francisco, to try it out. Check the XC60 Web site to see if Volvo is holding a demonstration in your area.
City Safety is a standard feature on the XC60, a new Volvo model coming to dealerships in March. Operating at speeds slower than 20 mph, it will stop the car if it senses an impending accident. The system has a forward-facing laser that can detect objects in the car's path. If the car senses a collision, and the driver isn't hitting the brakes or turning the wheel, it will apply full force to the brakes, bringing the car to a full stop.
The system is designed to stop low-speed collisions in heavy traffic or city driving. For speeds of 20 mph and faster, the XC60 can be ordered with the radar-based precollision system, which also controls adaptive cruise control. According to Volvo, 75 percent of collisions happen at low speeds, so the City Safety system should make insurance companies happy.
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(Credit:
Corinne Schulze/CBS Interactive)
The Audi A4 gets a serious update for 2009, with a much-needed cabin tech overhaul. But the fun really starts with the new Quattro all-wheel-drive system, which gets a new rear differential. We put it to the test on some slick roads, pushing it to the limits of traction. Along the way, we also try out the new Audi Drive Select feature, which lets you choose from sport or comfort settings for the steering, suspension, and transmission.
Cobra XRS 9960G (click to enlarge)
My first radar detector only had a row of green and red lights and beeped when you got close to being nailed by a radar gun--awfully quaint in comparison to all that Cobra's 2009 radar devices can do. There are six new units in the line priced from $59.95 to $339.95, but the flagship models have all the new fun-fun features.
The XRS 9960G (pictured) and the XRS R10G can be used right out of the box with a GPS locator the size of a thumbdrive that plugs into a USB port on the side of the units (a feature carried over from current flagship, the R9G). This lets you receive alerts about speed and red-light cameras from Cobra's database, including what direction the alert is coming from and a picture-in-picture view of simultaneous GPS and radar/laser alerts. You can also add in up to 1,000 location-based alerts of your own and program in speed alerts to keep your speed in check.
Both also feature OLED screen (1 inch for the R10G, 1.5 inches for the 9960G), Cobra's Super-Xtreme Range Superheterodyne (S-XRS) technology to pick up on the fastest laser and radar guns, and 15-Band detection.
Maybe we've been driving too many very nice cars lately, but the 2009 Mercedes-Benz SL550 didn't excite us much when it arrived in the garage. It's hard to follow acts like the Maserati GranTurismo and the BMW M6, and we tend to like shorter, more nimble sports cars. But the SL550 won us over with its handling on winding mountain roads and its striking looks with the sun blazing overhead and a nice ocean-scape in the background.
We were also prepared to be disappointed in the car's cabin electronics when we saw the old-style Mercedes-Benz interface, a plastic OK button surrounded by four directional buttons. But delving into this system, we discovered updated electronics behind the rather poor front, including a hard drive-based navigation system, iPod integration, and Bluetooth cell phone support.
On first getting into the 2009 Jaguar XF, the car seems like the ultimate in automotive tech. A red backlight on the engine start button pulses with a heartbeat cadence. Push it, and panels over the air vents open up while the shift dial rises from the console. That's right, a shift dial. Recognizing that most automatic transmissions are electronically controlled, the XF does away with a big legacy shifter, opting for a big dial that you turn to the different drive modes. The touch-screen interface uses a nicely designed set of menus, reminiscent of the LCARS computer interface from Star Trek.
But there are a few signs that Jaguar isn't quite ready for this tech future. The touch-screen interface is slow, taking a few moments between the time you touch a button and the resultant action. The information architecture is also poor, with too many actions required to access the iPod integration screen, for example. It's too bad Jaguar isn't still a Ford property, as the XF could really benefit from Ford Sync. Driving tech is better, though, as the XF can be had with a blind spot warning system and adaptive cruise control, not to mention the excellent audio produced by the Bowers and Wilkins stereo system.
