Gadgetory

Volkswagens latest golf are no handicap here figuring out why your car is dead in the morning and the most fuel-efficient hi-tech VX it's time to check the tap II see cars differently we love them on the road and under the hood but also check the tech and are known for telling it like it is ugly is included at no extra cost the good the bad the bottom line this is CNET on cars welcome to CNET on cars the show all about high-tech cars and modern driving i'm brian coulis well Volkswagens golf r is the king of the golf line which is perhaps the most durable brand of compact affordable drivers cars and sort of understated yet we've never driven one here on the show so it's time to get to it let's get out there on the road in the 2015 and check the tech this is a fun little box takes me back to the first Golf GTI I drove way back in the day this is what it felt like the world is full of affordable cars with kind of gray and white personality and the golf has always been different no variant more saturated than this guy the Golf R now it's not a car for everyone it's high in price and low in production volume but it cast an important halo over the entire Volkswagen line with its road-going prowl s spotting one is surprisingly tricky you'll see some very small subtle are badges around the side flanks in the rear it's got some different functional air scoops around the sides of the chin a little different set of wheels and body kit but overall it's not a car that shouts look with my owner bought it instead says rather confidently look what I can do right off the bat I've always liked these VW cabins and I still do they're clean they're kind of classic a quality of materials in here remains really good as for this head unit this is the best argument for using a smartphone luckily there's not much of it it is touch based it's got some very crude pinch zoom and swipe that is barely responsive they did waste time on things like proximity sensing so ribbons of buttons come and go which doesn't really get me anywhere they should have put that effort in that investment into things like much faster voice glynn please say a country or a state first California sometimes it even starts by asking me what country I want to drive to you have note modern infotainment applications or anything like that am/fm HD satellite you've got this pigtailed device there MDI that they use which is really horrible you've got to buy specialized cables and don't lose them the overall interface display quality and clunkiness of the voice command system on here is dreadful that of course is not the point of buying a Golf R so let's get on to our drive controls here is your current one choice only gear shift which is your DSG shift lever you click through for drive modes each one ups the aggression of the shifting and the powertrain that includes our adaptive suspension which is optional on this car our electric steering assist level our engine power on rush now in here is a big part of where you're spending that extra 14 grand or so over a GTI 2-liter turbocharged direct-injected four-cylinder sitting sidesaddle that may sound like a story you've heard before but this one's more uptight than the other ones we're getting some real power here 292 horse 280 pound-feet of torque vehicle weighs thirty three hundred pounds gets up to 60 in just under 5 seconds but still delivering 2330 MPG though it wants those MPG to be done on the backs of premium gallons now behind that engine is one drivetrain right now all-wheel drive at a sporting fashion with a Haldex center differential this is Audi Quattro cousins stuff and interestingly you cannot get a manual gearbox on the 15 you can only get a six-speed dual-clutch or DSG as VW calls them in 2016 that will be joined by a six-speed manual option they'll reduce the cost by a grand or so as well as bringing you some purity of purpose the first thing I notice in our Golf R is that let's face it a two litre inline-four with a turbo is always gonna feel like a two litre inline-four with a turbo you can get buried under a lack of boost or two taller gear pretty easily so it's a car you got to stay involved in but that doesn't bother me because that's why you bought an r got a whole mess of power coming on here right when I need it as long as I keep the revs up and keep that turbo spool now we have that DCC adaptive suspension I haven't done an a/b against the dead steel version but this car does not suffer from any understeer you point it and it kicks right in that way I love the sound this car makes but turns out what I'm hearing isn't necessarily just the engine there's something up in the towel at the base of the windshield electronic device called the sound actor which resonates a synthetic growl up through the bottom of the glass apparently a lot of folks get in there and unplug it I gotta say it's kind of unseemly for one of the last great honest driving cars so I'm sad they put it there but maybe the engine doesn't sound very good now I know many of you rue the fact we don't yet have a manual gearbox in this vehicle but I can tell you this is a super snappy sharp and quick DSG it's got pretty good around town manners with the exception of getting caught flat-footed sometimes an automatic mode however I'd like to have that third panel just to really get in touch with the simple but brawny honesty of this car just a little better and despite our 19th hour low-profile tires ride quality is really good you will have no problem in everyday driving with your arm since the last Golf R we've picked up 36 horsepower and three mpg highway plus some torque let's price out our little R or D your red friend now a Golf R starts a little bit over 37,000 with destination and by the time you add the adaptive suspension and nav package that's one line item like we have you're at about 40 grand here's what I'm gonna do though I want purity in this to really honor its golf roots but also enjoy its special hardware I'm gonna take out the adaptive suspension and nav package I'm also gonna wait till 2016 and buy the next generation that has a six-speed manual that takes eleven hundred dollars off the price and now I'm just over 36 this is not a golf for everyone in fact you don't need my opinion to tell you to buy one you've already made up your mind what this car really does show is that Volkswagen as much or more than any other car maker knows how to extend the line without blurring its you find our full review on the 15 golf are over at cars cnet.com well the conventional wisdom would have you thinking everybody is running around texting and driving these days turns out the truth is a little more nuanced than that in both good and not-so-good way we come back we'll find out what the smarter and not so smart driver is doing with handheld electronics behind the wheel dealing with mobile devices in the car has been approached three major ways first of all you've got the family of Bluetooth hands-free either brought in or built into the car and headset technology secondly you've got an ever-increasing voice recognition both in the car and on the mobile device itself to try and get your hands and eyes off of it and thirdly you've got laws and public awareness campaigns that use both stick and carrot to try and get you to do the right thing or at least do it in a safer way 17 states currently ban any handheld use of a mobile device while driving 48 BAM texting specifically with only Montana and Arizona holding out how's it all working well the latest US Department of Transportation research indicates two things the numbers aren't as high as you might think and those numbers aren't changing much either in 2013 the latest data available researchers observed over 37,000 cars stopped for at least 10 seconds in traffic or at a light at almost 1400 locations around the country drivers holding a phone to their ear has been observed to decline modestly from 5.2 percent in 2012 to four point six percent observed in 2013 that's still about six hundred twenty thousand cars at any given time during the day being driven by someone who has half their hands and at least half their mind on a call the other interesting trend line is visible manipulation of a handheld device and that rolls up texting email entering a GPS destination skimming facebook what-have-you it's gone from point four percent before the iPhone was introduced to one point seven percent today or about 230,000 cars on us roads and any given time of day it pays to double check your state's laws on handheld calling texting while driving and handheld use at all and follow them there so many technologies that make it easy to do now it's just the right thing and remember that even a small percent of drivers doing those things adds up to the better part of a million accidents waiting to happen welcome back to see net on cars coming to you from our home at the Mount Tam Motor Club just north of the Golden Gate Bridge well I can hardly think of anything more frustrating than a battery in your car that's dead every morning and the frustrating part is what's causing it this so-called parasitic loss or phantom draw is frustrating to track down because unless it's caused by something visible like a light bulb how do you spot it but I can show you some simple tips to track it down very quickly that you're likely going to need at some point with today's heavily electrical and electronic cars now the first thing you want to do before you start this process is to make sure you've got a good battery state good charge and since the car has been crapping out I bet you've already invested in a battery charger so hook it up overnight let it charge up the battery before we get started you should see good numbers on the display next make sure the car is not actually drawing any power obviously it got to be switched off the key is out doors are closed and no lights are on if some of those take a moment because of internal timers now set up your meter for a test like this I want you to put the black cable that came with it into the port called common and the red test lead goes in the one that will typically say 10 amps 10 a or 10 a DC like this one because that's the kind of test we're gonna be doing then turn your meter on and go to the 10 amp DC position on it's dial now it's time to attach your meter if you've got a charger connected to the battery now you want to pull it off now you want to put your positive terminal back on make sure the car has that on and tightened so positive is back on negative stays off then your meter is put in line between the cable for negative and the terminal for negative now most clips are only big enough to go around your cable getting around that terminal on the batteries asking a lot to just hold your connector there and take a look at the reading on the meter what you want to see is a number that is in the milliamp so very low number 30 40 maybe 50 at most it's okay the battery is not gonna die very soon with that little bit of trickle but when I see what I've got here nearly two and a half amps that's a dramatically bigger draw and that's gonna kill my battery overnight now that I verified I've got a draw I need to go into the car to look for it but still see the meter operating so get some kind of a clamp like one of these and make sure you've got both of your leads from your meter connected to the battery so you can be hands-free this is important when you've got your meter hooked up like this do not start the car turn on the headlights or do anything like that leave the car dead or you're gonna fry that meter and who knows what else put this meat up in the windshield where you can see it and then let's go around the driver's door okay now with our meter set up where I can see it up on the windshield I go down to the fuse box by the way some cars have several scattered around the vehicle check the owners manual luckily here on the Boxster we just have one to deal with now it's just a very simple process just start pulling each fuse one at a time look at the meter see if it drops your draw down where it should be and if not put the fuse back in go on to the next one it's tedious but it's easy I cost you nothing okay I've been pulling fuses for a few minutes here getting no results and then all of a sudden I found one that did look at that nice low current reading that's c3 on this car so I grabbed a little fuse and app and see what it says and it tells me that's basically interior locking and lights so I've discovered the system that is doing the draw now from here it's going to be up to you whether you want to have it fixed or whether you think you can look around and find out what the problem is if you do want to try and go further and diagnose it there are four major areas to look at is there a motor that's running when it shouldn't is there a light staying on when it shouldn't is there a switch that's causing one of those to stay on when it shouldn't or is there a wire going to one of those things that I've discovered that it's frayed or damaged that's arcing out against some piece of metal in the car now whether you're gonna fix the problem you've identified or take it to a shop and get it done you really accomplished two things just now with almost no effort and no cost you got peace of mind about what the problem really is and secondly you just found an easy way to buy yourself some time if you can live without the system but this fuse used to power up you can leave it out and now your car is not going to discharge until you get the time and/or money to get it fixed in a moment exploding sunroofs and v8 engine cars that won't embarrass you at the pump CNET on cars returns you driver assists seem to be coming into a world to take away from us the pleasure of driving and for that we will never forgive them but sometimes they can be a little bit useful for example in slow traffic up to about 37 miles an hour this car can read the traffic signs it can read the road markings and how fast and how far the car in front of you is up to 37 miles an hour and if you live in London like I do that is the top speed you achieve most of the time effectively meaning that it could drive me to and from work buy more from the ex car team of CNET UK at cnet.com slash welcome back to see net on cars i'm brian coolie here's that part of the show where I take one your emails and this time it comes in from Alex M who says I've been recently hearing from friends about exploding Sun roofs and panoramic glass roofs seems like no one really knows the exact reason was wondering if you guys have some idea I have a sunroof in my car and I want to know what I can do to minimize if not eliminate having this problem yeah I bet well Alex we checked into this a bit for you and it seems to affect in fairly small numbers some VW Audi Hyundai and Kia's by my research and it's not common in within those production runs now what's happening here by the best guesses in the auto glass biz is that we've gone to very thin glass on those overhead panels really all around the car to save weight and also better and better door seals to be honest so when you're closing the door on one of these cars it has thinner glass you're getting a pressure wave inside the vehicle and apparently under certain conditions that are not fully understood it may cause that roof to shatter or get weak enough to shatter later now the good news about auto glass in general is that it's either tempered laminated or both your windshield for example is both that means it's laminated with a thin sheet of plastic in between two sheets of glass if it breaks it tends to hold together as one piece and not even fall down on you unless it's a massive collision other glass around the sides and over your head like you're concerned about our temper and that means do shatter they don't create these sharp knife like shards you see in the movies they make a bunch of little small pebbles of glass that are much less likely to injure you though it's going to freak out if this thing goes bang while you're driving down the road or even when you get in the car and close the door if you want to find out if your car is affected by this head over to the Nitsa website where you can look up by VIN number exactly what recalls apply to your car not just your run of cars but your exact model it's the best way to get some peace of mind I wouldn't lose too much sleep over it but it is happening out there well throughout the year we like to bring you list of the most efficient for cylinders hybrids plug-in hybrids and most efficient electric vehicles for that matter all going that green direction but this time we're going to cut the other direction into a direction that technology has made possible top-5 fuel-efficient v8 now we looked at mpg sheer horsepower and the car's power-to-weight ratio the list we came up with is all German by the way except for one American at the top kicking all their jus tonic acids number Five's of 2015 BMW 550i a 4.4 liter v8 that delivers 20 mpg average it just pushed out the excellent mercedes e 550 coupe by the way to begin the list this Beamer has 145 horsepower and a power-to-weight ratio just below that magic number of 10 pounds per horse very good hit a great handling car that just happens to be a very practical sedan there's a lot to like here for about 65 grand second cheapest on our list number for the 2015 audi s8 four liter v-8 20 mpg average the sporting version of the big Audi has a v8 that you'll know when you step on it it cranks out the most horsepower on our list 520 now the average mpg of 20 is at the bottom of our list walnuts MSRP of 115 grand is at the top of our list hence number 4 number three the 2015 Audi a8 same basic engine but now 22 mpg average what a difference a single letter makes going from s to a makes this the only car in our list to break 30 highway and still have that 22 average but we keep it at number three because it is a big boy and this smallish v8 means a power-to-weight ratio that was our worst at 10.32 the 2015 Mercedes slk55 AMG a biggish five and a half liter v8 but still 22 mpg average who knew you bought an AMG to be fuel-efficient this is the baby brother of the big SL and it's got the power-to-weight ratio to show for it aleem 8.6 pounds per horse that makes it okay for it to be the lowest powered car on our list at 415 while time for the best average mpg sticking clean is everything number one you'll be glad to hear is the 2015 chevy corvette 6.2 liter v8 but still 21 mpg average the new c7 Vette is amazing having the biggest engine on the list doing 455 horse and has the best power-to-weight ratio as well mpg is 1729 close enough to say and get about 30 largely thanks to cylinder deactivation that make it a 3 point 1 liter for when you don't need everything add to that the lowest price on our list about 55 k if you've got a sanctimonious prius driving cousin this is the v8 to drive to Thanksgiving thanks for watching hope you enjoyed this episode keep those emails coming it's on cars at cnet.com we get a lot of show ideas from them I read every one reply to as many as I can and don't forget if you haven't already look for us on your favorite streaming platform or destination check it out we're probably already there I'll see you next time we check the tech you