Gadgetory

an incredibly cutthroat sector of the automotive business here's the ninth the kia wields the all-nude REO we've got the top trim the SX let's drive it and check the tech now the inside of the REO looks a bit like their upscale cars they've got the chrome trim of the sporty kind of shapes you definitely don't get a downscale feeling but remember we're in an SX with the top trim that Premium Package also rolls in a rear camera though I think you get a rear camera optionally on the II X the lower model as you can see it's a nice clear rear image but there's no trajectory projection just three different distance lines and no fancy camera angles as for the nav itself we've seen this before it's a well rendered if a little bit busy looking system but it's got a nice easy-to-read set of street names roads are pretty well displayed so they're clear this car does not have the UVO voice command system which is one of they did with Microsoft like the affected line instead I preferred to jump here on the old-fashioned buttons and just start entering things with the touchscreen which moves quite nicely by the way this works while you're driving not that I want you to be doing that but your passenger can get on it and all your other ancillary buttons for doing things are nice and big and clear I like that about this system now in terms of Drive electronics in this vehicle you've got a one choice only 6-speed automatic here shiftable gate pretty garden-variety stuff no paddles even on this sx sports edition over here this button says active eco that takes you in or out of an economy mode where it really dials back throttle response and generally shapes the engine response curve to sip gas what you don't have in this car is the auto start/stop technology that doesn't come on the sport model this SX okay in our audio sources being a kia or hyundai you've got this guy here this aux USB right next to each other that use a special cable that can go into your iOS device or of course you can go one or the other thumb drive or aux cable AM and FM radio no HD radio on this guy satellite radio is Sirius that also powers the live traffic to the nav system three months complimentary when you buy a new one of these optical disk is up here for your cd's only you've got bluetooth hands-free but there is no bluetooth streaming four speakers is standard in a real and then you get these two guys in the pillar for a total of six these tweeters are SX only a couple other touches we have in a premium package which is where we got the navigation system brings you this power glass roof up here this push button start stop leave it in your pocket wireless key and these heated leather seats now let's go check out the engine bay now under the hood here's a pretty good example of mainstream modern engine making circa 2012 a sub 2 liter engine 1.6 in this case in line for sidesaddle driving the front wheels of courts direct injection allowing them to get 138 horsepower and 123 foot-pounds of torque out of this guy 2500 pound car gets up to 60 in around mid 7s high sevens and that while delivering 30 40 mpg for knees the magic number if you hit that you're in a special Club by the way if you get the lower trim version the e^x you're going to also have the auto start/stop technology applied here but all the gains U is 1 mpg city so it ok let's take a little spin on our Kia Rio now I try to cup with some headline for what this car drives like and I couldn't it just drives fine there's nothing bad about it nothing notably good about it it's not terribly sprightly it's not terribly sluggish the ride quality is not harsh the ride quality is not amazingly nice and it's a very nice compact car visibility is actually quite good and if that matters to you but there's a couple things that I would call out that are interesting that mpg number I'm at what mid thirty one's right there that's actually low when I was on a trip over a lot of mountainous highways and shifting it manually a lot I was around 33 34 I couldn't beat the 30s out of this thing it does really well in actual driving fuel economy and that's a big part of why you buy this car I did find that I missed paddle shifters which I often consider to be a gimmick but on this car it rewards manual shifting when you need to get a really significant response out of it the only other note I would make is that as you drive this car you don't get the feeling you're in as inexpensive a car as it is largely because of the interior appointments on this SX trim level they've really done a good job I think for the amount of money they're the extracting from your pocket oh by the way taking off the Eco button didn't make a big difference in my estimation our behaves about the same way maybe a little less sluggishly to get the high MPG that it does it of course clings to the highest gear compulsively countenance okay let's price our cheap and cheerful 2013 Kia Rio SX this is the top trim car eighteen five antwon's porkpie not included on top of that you are going to get the Premium Package or you're an idiot it's an incredible value 2350 brings you navigation rear camera push-button start Wireless key power glass roof heated leather seats are you kidding of course you will