Gadgetory

ah the minivan the great maligned of the auto industry no one gets their kicks by buying one and yet an awful lot of people live with one every day Kia says they do one really well let's see in the latest version of the Sedona definitely outside the realm of the big three but maybe that's a mistake we're driving a 2015 Sedona SXL as we check the tech when you put a minivan in your line you don't exactly expect it to be a Halo vehicle do you you leave that to your sport coupes and your sexy crossovers this guy just has to sell well bottom line what Kia's done to make their argument to that direction is to take their in arguably slick-looking very urbanized style they have these days put in some good cabin tech we've seen on their cars before and try to make the second row a special place all of that at a special price let's see how well they do now of course in a hide Ram minivan you almost care more about the second row than the first row so here we are in what they call first-class lounge seats in the second row you do give up one but in the second row so now you're down to seven total passengers however you get adjustable footrest you've got one of these butterfly headrests like you have on those nice airline seats of course you can recline this thing way back almost flatter this is a weird control here look at this I can slide left and right same one with that guy so if you have two folks back here hate each other like when you're going to a family reunion this is perfect now familiar kia cabin design and here this has got the sporty fresh kind of really handsome look that a lot of other kids have you're not given that up because you're driving a minivan that's the good news here's the star of the show 8 inch touch LCD and a typical kia fashioned the touch response is quick crisp and responsive you've also got voice command on this guy but there is no other type of controller so we're in a high trim Sedona that means we have navigation that I've always found pretty good from these guys we've also got Infiniti surround sound just about every source you want we're not missing anything here from Satellite Radio to Pandora to Spotify aha a lot of the stuff comes in through what they call their UVO services platforms you've also got the ability to go to what they call their App Store that's where you go to add in things like Pandora iHeartRadio or Yelp there's also built in support for Siri eyes free and you may have noticed on that voice command screen there's a tab there for Google local search the frustrating part is this works through the Wi-Fi connection not through a pairing to your phone so your phone either needs to be a hotspot or you got to be parked in the driveway or somewhere connecting to a fixed hotspot that's goofy now our vehicles also got several driver assists on it from cameras rear cameras available pretty low on these guys we've also got a surround view camera on here that works particularly well it's good sharp imagery one choice only on the transmission 6-speed automatic so this shifter is going to be common to all of them no paddles or anything on the wheel they don't do that on Sedonas and while I like the touch response on the screen I think these home run buttons here are all nicely done some of the switch gears crap in this car when you put this shifter over in the sport gate the shiftable gate on the left and kick it back and forth you can't even tell if you've made a gear change or not by its feel it's just gummy and weird ditto for the headlight dimming stalk I had to fiddle with it twice every time I wanted to take the headlights up or down there's like no feedback to it weird sloppy machinist now up front the Sedona has gone down an engine size not too unusual these days but still notable 3.3 liter v6 now down from a three and a half liter v6 there was in here last year the power numbers went up though 276 horsepower 248 pound-feet of torque mpg is okay it's 1824 which is disappointing for a smaller engine to go look at Nissan Honda Chrysler they're all doing better on average mpg than this guy one last note where we go for a drive this is front wheel drive like most minivans however some folks really like to have all-wheel drive in their minivan imagine that you want to get around all year long and that's where you got to go shop at iota Sienna so what I'm going to tell you about a Kia Sedona that is different than other minivans not a whole lot to be honest it's an isolated quiet riding vehicle modern minivans all do that do that really well it's got very good road manners but not if you press it there's no performance in this vehicle the engine I gotta say seems a little bit on the underpowered side but not criminally so the bottom line is I think that normally I never think of kia as making a minivan when folks ask me for a recommendation for one I don't think I have remembered to mention them so that might be the main takeaway it should be one you consider with the big boys we've got a very high-end Sedona here so don't Blanche won't tell you it starts a little bit over 40,000 dollars but this is an SX L now on top of that I am gonna add nearly 3 grand 2700 to be specific for the tech package that gets us better headlights the lane departure warning forward collision warning a very nice surround view camera and adaptive cruise control now we're a little bit over 43,000 dollars this vehicle is not thrilling to drive although it's also competent on the road the second row is definitely one of the more luxurious places you can sit in a car today at just about any price and Kia's cabin tech has been strong with the exception of a couple of weird quirks we showed you there it's definitely a worthy challenger to what is a much better selling set of competition you