Gadgetory

oh what a stink there was last year when VW D content did the Jetta to bring it down in price to compete better with Camry and Accord certain engineering sacrifices had to be made to get there but here's the model that answers all those snide comments about it being a German Accord this is the Jetta GLI Autobahn let's drive it and check the tech now right off the bat these GL eyes get an LCD head unit you get all excited then you start looking around there's no button that says nav that's because LCD doesn't equal navigation in this car part of their pricing strategy to keep Jenna's grounded in their cost what you have is your AM and FM radio is also HD radio on this guy because of this trim level satellite radio is serious they give you three months when you buy the car media's where it gets interesting single CD slot up here on the top SD card down here media in that's this thing this MDI multi interface connector right now we've got an iPod cable on there and then Bluetooth audio is for streaming you do have base Bluetooth hands-free in jeta's but I'll tell you this LCD touchscreen is kind of irrelevant I don't know for such simple things especially without navigation if I need a touchscreen bass output on a GLI is going to be six speakers and indiscriminate amplification we have the Autobahn Edition that brings in the equally inscrutable Fender audio eight speakers plus one sub I just don't think it's that impressive a system it's fine but the Fender brand doesn't say accurate sound to most people it says guitars to most people and the Autobahn Edition also includes this power moon roof up here dual zone automatic climate control this very nice faux leather they call it V Tech's kind of like a take on Mercedes mb-tex it's a really nice material and you also get 18-inch fancy-looking wheels one more step up is to get the navigation trim level which adds navigation it's kind of a crude system but it's something and it's only seven hundred bucks for that package now the heart of the GL i's story is the engine this is a great one two litre sidesaddle four turbocharged direct-injection a lot of good stuff going on here 200 horsepower 207 foot-pounds of torque gets this 3100 pound car to sixty and six and a half seconds just fast enough I would say while delivering 22 33 mpg that power goes out of one or two gearboxes your base is a six-speed manual thank you but you can also get a 6-speed direct shift dual clutch that's what we've got let's go see how that works all this direct shift gearbox is one of the better especially considering it's in an affordable car of the dual clutch manuals are all the rage right now got paddles here on the wheel we didn't show you but they're pretty common these days response is good it's not jerky but it's really crisp and tight and I find that the sport mode down here on the gate is also another good choice it seems to be well programmed makes a nice note when you get in it and the power delivery is pretty even for a turbo of small displacement this is different than the base Jetta which has this kind of torsion beam rear suspension that's pretty crude stuff we've got independent rear suspension multi-link apparatus on this car it does handle very nicely once in a while I got some kind of rear up and some front wheel hop so I would lose traction but that was pretty infrequent that said I think I would still go for the manual gearbox or at least drive one seriously if I was going to buy one of these cars because this just seems elaborate to me the message around a jetta is one of pretty straightforward simplicity and this is a level of translation that I don't need I'd give my own with a clutch I think the last note is where does this car fall between sporty and everyday comfortable on this GLI we've got 18 inch wheels and correspondingly lower profile tires you get quite a bit of tire drum in this car on the other hand this generation of Jetta has a much more compliant ride in the outgoing so somewhere in the GLI family is the right mix I might go for a straight GLI and not the autobahn edition that was the manual gearbox is humbly my perfect um