Gadgetory

it's not retro like a challenger it's not forget' ibly like every other car like when every other car its the uniquely American Dodge Charger we got it in the r/t trim that means we got a Hemi let's take a ride of this 2012 American beast and check the tech doing that next now the first thing you notice about a Chrysler these days is the J gunda screen here in the middle it says 8.4 inch is very squarish it's one of the better interfaces these days if not the most elegant looking I mean the blue and red color scheme I could live without but it's really responsive and you've got a persistent ribbon of your functions here at the bottom now let's see what's behind them Radio is am/fm satellite radio no HD radios available we also have serious powered travel link for fuel prices and gas station locations and in stock ticker because you know you're always checking your stocks while you drive under player we have our more interesting media under source you see I've got my optical disc here SD card here you're never going to use that auxilary jack and USB are here in the console I've got my iPod in there now it does a really good job of putting the information on the screen uses the real estate very nicely bluetooth streaming works pretty well I didn't get any metadata on my droid running Android 2.3 dot something I also had very intermittent transport controls that's one of those things where they say check our Bluetooth site I don't care I'm not going to go buy a phone based on my car and I'm not going to buy a car based on my phone and of course we have bluetooth streaming Bluetooth hands-free calling phonebook transfer that's all pretty much the price of admission on cars today and of course these chrysler products have a pretty good incoming text message display you can have them read to you if you're driving read them if you're stopped and you've got this new message area to send out some canned messages without too much distraction hey dog looking for half a key Oh hook me up they should rename the controls menu the place where things that should have a physical button go to die I like my heated seats my vented seats all that stuff have a physical persistent mechanical switch similarly I think sport mode should be a button by the transmission not a soft button buried somewhere on a screen where I may have to leave radio to go change to sport mode that makes no damn sense navigation as you may know by now is the childish but highly rated Garmin powered system I mean it looks like a cartoon right however this guy scores like a son of a bitch in JD power ratings it is considered the easiest to use the highest consumer satisfaction look how simple that is duh or duh what I did find though is it's great for navigation very clear very simple it's not good for browsing ODEs I was out just kind of rambling around the country yesterday and it does a really crappy job of letting me follow myself on a map with great detail of small roads around me it didn't even recognize most of them one choice on the gearbox kind of antiquated 5-speed automatic they call it a slapstick because you can slap it right and left to shift or you can use the paddles down shift up shift here on the wheel and of course that sport mode I showed you before is going to do a few things it's going to change your throttle mapping to get a little more easy tip-in on the gas it's going to also hold revs higher and it's going to seek Top Gear less now our high trim car has blind spot detection cross traffic alert when you're backing out to traffic and going to get t-boned we have forward collision warning at two different levels of sensitivity and adaptive cruise control so the car will maintain a gap and not just a speed when you're in cruise mode this car has smart beam headlights that means they try to always be on high beam when they detect oncoming lights it will Taylor down the intensity and the beam pattern to pull it down toward a low beam but it's a very different technology than either a two-position beam pattern or one that defaults to low okay yeah it's got a heavy that's what this RT is all about couple things going on here this is a car that gets decent mpg we'll talk about in a minute they're using a fuel saver technology it's cylinder deactivation when you don't need the power this guy turns into a four cylinder they end up activating one four six and seven and the other four Pistons cylinders will go to sleep through a combination of turning off the ignition turning off the fuel flow and turning off the valvetrain on those guys now those numbers three hundred and seventy horsepower out of this 5.7 liter v8 395 foot-pounds of torque moves this 4500 pounds today into sixty in a little under six seconds while delivering 16 25 mpg not bad 15:23 though if you get all-wheel drive get the rear-wheel drive be an American not a communist my main impression I get when I come away from this vehicle is you feel its weight as I mentioned it's 4,500 pounds and it doesn't mystify you thinking it's like 3,000 it feels like 4,500 pounds that's not a bad thing it's a big ol heavy beast of a car but that also does tell the story the engine is somewhat trapped behind software that is not ideal I don't think the software is reaching for higher mpg at all time seeking top gear the sport mode doesn't really transform the car that much it's a real honey when you get into the paddles and drop it down a couple gears and lock it there that's what unlocks the motor it's that thing I touch on a lot responsiveness versus power big difference this car has lots of power trapped behind software keeping it from becoming as responsive as it could be I wish had a better exhaust note RT to me means it has a little more growl when you get into it this one doesn't really have much now some growl there but there's also some Dyson in there as well it's doesn't make it feel real athletic okay let's price this charger and do it CNET style the r/t starts at about 31 but it's missing too many of the tech toys and most of the good stuff comes in trim level upgrades so go all the way to the top to the RT max that's going to add some six thousand dollars to the price now we're pushing 38 but to get all the goodies then and most of them I like your Alucard options are all-wheel-drive 2350 pass sunroof about a thousand