Gadgetory

the best of LA Auto Show 2015 and beloved Italian comes Beck's Cadillac replaces their best-selling model and presto change-o inside a fascinating new Volvo it's time to check the tech EC cars differently under the hood but also check the tech included at no extra cost the good the bad the bottom line this is CNET on cars welcome to see net on cars i'm brian coulis it is of course the show all about high-tech cars and modern driving special episode this time we're coming to you from the Los Angeles Auto Show 2015 if you're seeing this soon enough this show will turn out to be your guide once you get here if you're coming to the show if you're unable to go this is gonna be your highlight reel I'm gonna distill this thing all the way down to the six cars I think are essential here on this vast show floor starting off with one that I think is the belle of the ball the crowd-pleaser of this entire show this year the Fiat 124 bringing back a legendary name but on a very different platform in fact not even Fiats as Emmy Hall shows us hey everyone it's Emmie hall with CNET here at the 2015 Los Angeles Auto Show and 2017 promises to be a very cool year for those of us that love rear-wheel drive convertibles that's right I am talking about the 2017 Fiat 124 spider Fiat recognize that good thing when they thought in the new fourth-generation Mazda mx-5 but here they've given us a 1.4 liter turbocharged four-cylinder just good for 160 horsepower and 184 pound-feet of torque now those of you that are keeping score yes that is more than the mx-5 but it's just right about in line with Sofia a Bart power is going to the rear wheels via a 6-speed manual transmission or a 6-speed automatic and unfortunately this is not the same six-speed as in the mx-5 so we can't wait to get our hands on it to see if Fiat has been able to give us the same crispy short throws that we've come to expect in a small convertible roadster now on lookers surely are not going to confuse the 124 spider for the mx-5 as the sheet metal is quite different it really has a throwback more to the original 1966 versions the headlights have definitely a more rounded appearance to them as well as the horizontal oval grille in the centre and the rear I've just got a modern take of the rectangular simple taillights from the 1960s of course it's what's under the sheet metal that makes this car fun to drive the Fiats got the same multi-link setup in the rear as well as a double wishbone suspension in the front as the mx-5 and it has an electric power steering system setup and Fiat chose to keep it simple using the same manual soft top as the mx-5 the interior of the 124 spider is pretty much a carbon copy of the mx-5 save for a couple of fiat badging it uses the same seven-inch touchscreen with blind spot monitoring and rear cross-traffic alerts no pricing has been announced yet but we expect to see this little baby in showrooms in the summer of 2016 so mark your calendars a remarkable collaboration there with literally the mazda miata platform underpinning this dramatically different least in market position model from a completely different car making brand Fiat now the best-selling car of Fiats day back in the 80s was the 124 the best-selling Cadillac today is the Cadillac SRX and yet they just sent it packing replacing it with the new XT 5 here at the Los Angeles Auto Show Cadillac just unveils a 2017 XT 5 this is the first of four upcoming crossover SUV models that Cadillac will use to kind of revamp its lineup this has a lot of the styling you see on its current coupe and sedan cars the ATS ncts and the coming ct6 with electric power steering and an adaptive suspension the driver will be able to choose different modes at the push of a button from sport to comfort this car has a 3.6 liter direct-injected v6 engine the produced of 310 horsepower now that's mated to an 8-speed automatic transmission there'll also be a really interesting all-wheel drive system in this car that can actually push 100% of a torque between the front and rear axles and also do torque vectoring across the rear axle for better handling for driver assistance features we get adaptive cruise control which can bring the car to a full stop and we also have a new rear-view mirror system which actually uses a camera and a display instead of it just a standard beer giving the driver a much better view behind them now for cabin electronics we get Cadillac SKU infotainment system in the past that hasn't worked so well but they say in this bottle we'll get a faster processor which should make the response a lot better and we also have support for apple carplay and android auto so you can use your smart phone if you like the 2017 Cadillac XTS goes on sale of spring of next year and marks a really new era in Cadillacs model lineup okay we're just getting started I've got four more rock star cars coming to you from here at the show floor in Los Angeles before we get back into those we've got an update for you on a recent smarter driver episode we did that in just a few weeks since then has become a front burner issue in Washington where this robotic technology is moving to the mainstream quickly the smarter driver is gonna hear all about the latest unseen on cars returned we recently took you through automatic emergency braking technology that allows the newest cars to handle part or all of the braking tasks when they sense that you and your reactions distractions or just frozen panic aren't going to cut it now there's a major update the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration just announced it has made automatic emergency braking a formal component of the recommended factors to get a car a 5-star safety rating highly coveted in the business this will start with cars in the 2018 model year beyond that this announcement moves a EB well down the road to one day perhaps being required for at least de facto standard equipment to that end the feds have just launched an online tutorial to educate the average car buyer about this technology what it's called what it is this decision is also the biggest step yet to make a building block of tomorrow's self-driving cars part of today's mainstream safety ratings and as we last reported 10 automakers who sell more than half the cars and light trucks in the US have already pledged to make AE be at least available across their lines by the way if you see a truck closing on you and your rear-view mirror right now you'll be relieved to hear that the American Trucking Association is also urging regulators to require a EB on new big rig soon even if part of their motivation may lie in achieving concessions elsewhere in trucking regulation automatic emergency braking it's clearly the darling of the new breed of automated driver assists and it pays to double check what other technologies will clear that bar soon I'm Brian Cooley welcome back to see net on cars special episode rounding up the best picks I think here at the Los Angeles Auto Show now nobody really shed a lot of tears about the exit of the ninth-generation Honda Civic it wasn't exactly a home run the current tenth generation much better and even much better than that is the just-released tenth generation Civic Coupe Annie Hall takes a look for us hey everyone its Emma Cole first cena and i'm here at the 2015 Los Angeles Auto Show and behind me is the 2016 Honda Civic Coupe now everything from the front of the a pillar forward it's just the same as a sedan what really starts the magic happening is behind I've got this very steeply raked roof almost a fastback kind of look which ends in just a little tiny flick for a rear spoiler and these brake lights here in the rear extend all the way across the rear spoiler in a very distinctive rear fascia centered on the 2016 Honda Civic Coupe is the 2-liter 4-cylinder which is good for 158 horsepower or 138 pound-feet of torque that is mated to a standard 6-speed manual transmission or the continuously variable transmission and that is good for 41 miles per gallon out on the highway you can also get any more peppy 1.5 liter turbocharged four-cylinder she's got more horsepower and more torque and unfortunately that's only available with the CVT inside you have the same navigation unit that's found in the Accord and that does support apple carplay as well as your Android phone newly available features include LED headlights remote start and heated front seats pricing had yet to be announced but the 2016 Honda Civic Coupe will be on sale later in the fall I'm a mija Christina here at the 2015 Los Angeles now staying in the same basic category of car let's shift from the Honda Civic to the Hyundai Elantra a car that got a big refresh and relaunch here at Los Angeles and in the process did what so many cards do come from relatively humble roots to start moving up town antwuan takes a look for us six best-selling car in the world characteristics generation in 2015 LA Auto Joe Hyundai said that it sold about 10 million Elantra since the nameplates inception and this new 2017 model looks poised to sell about a couple million more now the new 2017 Hyundai Elantra basically takes everything we liked about the fifth-generation model and makes it a little bit better in every way it's lighter it uses about twice as much high tensile steel and forty times more Aeronautics grade adhesive than its construction so it waves a lot less it's also larger it's only a little bit bigger on the outside but on the inside Hyundai's managed to squeeze a lot more interior space into the Elantra so much so that this compact car is now technically classified as a midsize sedan it's also a lot smarter inside the cabin we've got either a seven or an eight inch version of Hyundai infotainment system depending on whether you get navigation or not but we've also got the latest generation of Hyundai's bluelink infotainment system that's gonna allow you to do a lot of cool things like monitor your team's driving for speed alerts or curfew or if you've got an Apple watch or an Android wear device you can actually start your car and unlock your door from your wrist it's all very cool now under the hood we've got a new 2-liter four-cylinder engine that makes 147 horsepower and 132 pounds feet of torque it uses a lean atkinson cycle which allows it to get what Hyundai estimates to be about 33 miles per gallon combined but that's not as green as it's gonna get for the new Elantra in spring 2016 Hyundai will also debut an eco version of the Elantra that's going to use a smaller 1.4 liter turbocharged engine that the automaker says will do 40 miles per gallon or better on the highway what's more is that it's going to be even torque e'er than this motor right here putting out about 156 pound-feet so it should still be pretty fun to drive and for those who want even more fun to drive Hyundai says that it's gonna be putting out a new Elantra sport model later on that year it's gonna be the most powerful version of the nameplate yet I'm open for a 2-liter turbo but we could see Hyundai with 1.6 liter turbo in that vehicle Hyundai's gonna have more details surrounding the launch pricing and availability of the 2017 Elantra during the 2015 car show season so stay tuned to CNN for more details as they come out ok out of this whole vast LA Auto Show I just got two more picks for you on my short list and we're gonna get to those as soon as CNET on cars returns with our LA Auto Show special welcome back seen that on cars special edition doing things a little different this time because we're coming to you from the LA Auto Show with my list of six my six picks that I think are the essential ones to see here at the show this year including the newly revised 2017 Mercedes SL the SL has always been a fascinating almost a category of one if you will there's nothing quite like it and as we looked at it here this year it really said I am the s-class that is fun to drive giving up almost nothing in tech and engineering let's take a look when they've made changes in this 2017 they didn t radical surgery though they did do some plastic surgery to the face it used to be kind of ugly beautiful but now it's just plain beautiful as Mercedes does these days they have a five mode dynamic select control for the drivetrain personality and those drive trains are many SL 450 v6 SL 550 v8 SL 63 AMG v8 and the big boy the sl65 AMG v12 621 horse by the way the 0 to 60 time between them only varies by a second from top to bottom the pedestrian s l's if you can call on that get a 9 speed automatic the AMG flavors get a 7-speed automatic now the SL is always been a high tech engineering showcase for Mercedes not their biggest car but they shoehorn almost the most tech into it note this though they're touting how apple carplay is gonna be available in a package not worried about Android auto arrives in the US spring 2016 we'll get pricing a lot closer to then on all the barriers okay I think I've saved the most intriguing thing for last it's not even a car it's just the innards of one the cabin of one has reimagined by Volvo as they looked at the self-driving car beyond it moving down the road to what we'll be moving inside the car as it takes over their concept 26 vision of tomorrow's interior Antoine Goodwin takes a look for us we were expecting Volvo to unveil a new concept car a new model at the LA Auto Show and well they've brought us part of one this is their concept 26 and what's very cool about it is that it's a concept cockpit that shows us what's gonna happen when the car start driving themselves what are our role at the driver gonna be it's got three different modes the first mode that we see right here is the drive mode if your traditional hands on the steering wheel upright seating position from here you'll be in control of the car you'll do all the driving we've got the vertical census infotainment system right here on the center console it's just like your typical FBA platform Volvo vehicle right now now on the steering wheel we've got two paddles that allow you to enter the autopilot mode so you pull those two paddles the car goes into its autonomous mode and the seat slides back the since this infotainment system is on the center console so it moves with the driver so you don't really have to reach for it and as you see right here this large 25 inch color display flips out because the car is in autonomous mode you're now free to do some work or browse some media the seating position is a little bit more laid-back and relaxed and you're moved away from the steering wheel and it's sort of four tracks into the instrument cluster the third mode is going to be the relaxed mode and that's gonna be when you just want to kick back and let the car do its own thing while you relax the seat goes into a very very laid-back seating position we've got this little Ottoman that slides out and the 25 inch display hides itself from here you can relax while the car drives itself when you're ready to take control you just grab those paddles and the car gives you back control now what happens if you're kicking it and relaxing and something happens well the autonomous system should be smart enough that it'll be able to pull the vehicle over to a safe stopping location until you can two feet back into the upright position to take control of the car now this is conceptually based on Volvo's Bob platform so theoretically it could be in vehicles as soon as they're ready for the autonomous driving to catch up to the technology we see right here I hope you enjoyed this little special detour we took with CNET on cars this time bringing you a snapshot of the LA Auto Show if there's a piece that we're missing that you really wanted to see don't worry we got it go to cars dot cnet.com we're the largest scenic team ever deployed to an auto so really nailed this one it's all waiting for you there now of course we're back into our little Clubhouse just north of the Golden Gate Bridge with our next episode getting back to all the features that you know and love and keep those emails coming it's on cars at cnet.com I'll see you next time we check the tech when we get back off the road