Gadgetory

the OT makes it strongest stance yet against your in-car tech will take you for a little ride in the tesla model x virtually speaking and we're also going to show you who's the most dependable car out there whose tech isn't breaking its car tech live hello everybody this is episode 2 51 for this where is it 15th 16th of 6 16 x 2 days after valentines day how could forget that what a perfect way to remember dates you know in in May will be saying the same thing 74 days after valentines day I'd go with seven days after cinco de mayo oh that's right we can keep leapfrogging ahead behind anyways Brian Cooley Wayne Cunningham antuan goodwin stevo's at the controls today filling in for Mitch Chang who's going on our our big story actually just came out a little while ago this morning on Thursday through catching us live or shortly after we do the show here it's a new recommendation not binding but sounds real serious from the Department of Transportation run by old tech hater rail Ray LaHood and they have proposed new distraction guidelines these are voluntary and their guidelines they're neither laws nor firm regulations but they sure kind of read like them and they're going after distraction in cars at the OEM level we're not talking about you fumbling with your smartphone it's a whole different crews say this is the d.o.t and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration telling car makers you need to build the tech in cars differently you're making us nervous so here are the three basic thrust we're gonna put up a link in the show notes to this PDF which is a little wordy but if you look at the executive summary about page 9 is where it gets interesting three guidelines number one when it comes to non driving-related tech in the car things that are not essential driving the vehicle they want to make sure that car makers are going to dial back on displaying images or videos and aren't necessary dial back on displaying automatically scrolling text I'll be curious to get our take on that in a minute be careful of requiring manual text entry of more than six button or key presses per task or require reading more than 30 characters per task number 24 other non driving-related secondary things they want to work on the time that you spend on them and they say that they should have a rule of thumb saying that you don't glance away from the road for any tech task that's not essential to driving for more than two seconds or a cumulative time for a total of twelve seconds of two seconds or less looks to get a task done and there's also something here about one and a half second glances it all gets very dicey and finally the level three here they say the last one is that they want all device functions designed to be performed by the driver through I our hey I and hand coordination what they call visual manual so that that requires only one hand to operate I can't think of much tect requires two we'll talk about that steering wheel oh there's that I hope that qualifies is essential to driving and also they say that each active display should be located as close as practicable to the drivers forward line of sight so those are the basic recommendations what do we think well navigation seems like it's a one of those tech devices it's essential to driving well it's an interesting question is it essential driving or is there a nice add-on I think it's pretty essential driving because well mean for one cat's already out of the bag yeah people aren't going back to paper maps and 42 ray lahood wants them to well I mean 42 it's like even if even if you did I mean a paper map is even more of a driving distraction than the navigation app because before map doesn't do it does it doesn't follow itself people forgot how fun people used to fumble with paper maps propped up on the steering wheel back in the day needs to go driving down the road like that and the papers in the way you can't see through it it's or just like those like laminated sleeves that you would like put on your dash oh yeah for the seriously organized driver it'll be required to have a passenger in with you I read a map that's to regulation so I in turn here turn no single driving and you can't look at them no girls are worse than navigation systems actually baby there ladies talking about other stuff and they're like looking out the window and they're like oh crap that's return right there I mean it's very rare that I find phone in the passenger seat who will give me a turn like okay in about a mile or and a half you're gonna want to make sure you get over to the right calmly yeah proper distance as opposed to the oh crap yeah so when someone does it I'm surprised I look over like wow wow you don't give a good direction you gotta drive well it seems like there's some wiggle room in these directions I'm sure from then the nits aside they're probably they don't see the wiggle room but I think automakers could find it you know they mention images you should not have any distracted images or video now I hope they don't mean a map isn't images that's distracting right is that an image is that video it is moving how about the google Tech we've seen an Audi and BMW that kind of looks like video that Google Earth overlay oh yeah and then those in hybrid cars they have the powerful animation yeah that could be considered the statute video but you know maybe that's essential for the cars operation because you need to know where the power is coming from you need to know if your battery's dead no it's like it's like ages in the signal light there's that a what is it the it's called the blue something game on the hyundai cars yeah where you like start it up and you try to like max out your your fuel economy over 10 minute period you can see that being hit pretty hard by this but really show anything except some numbers and a representation of a car with wheel spinning but is that video you know is that we notice is what I want to ask you about Antoine as they said in here we don't like the idea of any automatically scrolling text that covers a lot of hidden units well mean that covers most RDS radio system that are already out there right yeah let alone satellite an ipod in fact we're getting away from those because the displays are getting bigger in cars and they don't need to scroll the town is interesting yeah although so many of them still do it always makes me nuts when they've got a big LCD and they don't take advantage of it they give you about an eight character window within it for RDS or maybe for HD radio types like why didn't you bump that out you've got a show like album artwork and other stuff on that screen that that's way more important than getting what song is that vertical I want to see if it was songs in the key of life or greatest hits well but it's this long time off it was on both man I need to know yeah so because I mean people people visually recognize albums right it's true no they don't yeah I do that was sarcasm well I haven't seen an album cover in years what one thing they mention of a certain age one thing they mention in your do is displays as close as practicable to the driver Linus yes now practical that has a lot of wiggle room because yeah you can't put a you know 17 inch display like right in front of the driver in place of the instrument cluster you know you have to put that in the console so this seems to urge maybe more head-up display yeah hey I don't join my mind's eye based on and the first time I heard this list is when you were just enumerated it so I'm putting together in my head with this this interface that they want is going to look like and I'm seeing gigantic head up display with a bunch of widget that you can like touch because you can't my hand yeah with one hand because you can't go more than a couple levels deep but you still need this information yep and a lot of do two seconds per interaction for a total of twelve seconds so job gigantic head up display 15 or 16 widgets kind of floating around minority report in front of you yeah and it ends up being more distracting nothing distracting about that and it would be if it were just just not there also said in here along with the closest practical to the forward line of sight include a specific recommendation for the maximum downward viewing angle to the geometric center of each display in other words get things up like head up and as opposed a lot of those displays that are not just over out of line of sight but they're also down below the dashboard horizon I mean we're so used to that now but is that really really good design can't all displays come up higher well you know we used to complain about the Porsche they used to have their yeah come in the kitchen manager screen down buddy on me yeah way down low and they started they raised that up and that that was definitely a good move on their part yeah a lot of the problem I've seen too with cars is the navigation system is optional and so for the car maker to make it something they can put in or pull out they have to put it lower on the dashboard because there's just room there well what a lot of them started doing just leaving the screen in there yeah all right you got nav where you don't get nav the screens there now it's just a gigantic climate control system yeah and I think that's what they should do though I think that's what makes sense to go in that direction screens are the screens are probably cheap enough that it doesn't add too much to the bottom line of the vehicle there's actually was a story we actually took it out of today's run down because we got this do t storage is going to take some time but there was a guy from Harmon the head of harman international which has all kinds of car tech brands as well as JBL and others under them saying in five years there will not be a car of any price point in the u.s. that doesn't have an LCD screen it may not be a big one but it'll least be of some decent size he wasn't talking about inch sizes in particular but there's an indication that yeah maybe everyone gets an LCD so that way they can at least get some consistency ok we're going to push the screen up it's got to be across all our cars we can't have to dash caps for every model one with LCD up high one without that gets a little messy from car makers but I kind of think the nits of people are just thinking like oh we can't have all cities in cars that's distracting it's it's an image on a screen and we can't have that you can I get that flavor from this don't you yeah and I also think I mean they mentioned a little bit about the you know cell phones and stuff like that disabling all these functions and you know if they make it so you pair your phone and when you're moving it disables the bluetooth well that's just stupid because people just going to pick up their damn phones and mega halls you know carrying the damn thing totally that's what happens when you do lock outs and you know we we see cars that go both ways some of them will have heavy lockout you go up to about two miles an hour if it's like a Toyota's bad on this they lock stuff out they get most time oh yeah failings employers right I had a hard time with the camry hybrid last night i was trying to input in a dress but i could not catch a red light saber right not what it's long enough right it looks like you get scraps and the voice comes not quick enough either so you can't really are I hate the problem was the voice command wouldn't let me put in an intersection it would let me put in a dress which was great what you didn't know let me put it in an intersection i need to get 2015 mission i don't know what street addresses down there i can get a wine up so that was that's a good example of how we're sitting there trying to punch something in the lockout won't let us what do you do you pick up your damn phone and you punch it into the google nav on your android device and guess what or you even talk to the android device but that's more distracting i think then using something that is built into the car i mean maybe not you know are we driving people back to maybe the the mobile device people need to step in is juggling your phone with really good voice rec better than anything I and hand built into a car and I'm putting it that way cuz I don't think any car maker makes really good voice technology not compared to the self the smartphone guys they just blow the car industry away the proud thing is though that all that smart phone voice right happens in the cloud yeah we can't use Siri without an internet connection you can't use google or vlingo yeah without an internet connection it's not I mean the the processing power for voice recognition it usually happens up there somewhere in space yeah wherever the Internet is huh well this is all non-binding it's they say it's voluntary regulation so if you parse that voluntary is obvious regulation is usually the same language they use when they tell car makers often not voluntarily that you know taillights must be a certain height bumpers have to be a certain height you may not have anything sticking out of the door handle on the outside that could catch a pedestrian and drag them down the street those are regulations that they have to follow these are regulations they don't but it's only one step from them saying okay we've tried these out and we're going to flip them over to ray required at some point that's the language they use regulation is these organizations form of law I wonder how long mr. LaHood is going to be in a lot present USA alive I saw you try and skip that word in trying to be polite all of a sudden Wayne books is true is ticket for DC if he retires in a couple of years these might not have much impact yeah he seems to be the big driver behind this although um you know this is coming from what's the relationship between mitza and DOD I'm unclear on that I think this is a department of do team okay okay so that's why this is all under under under ray or at least all being led by him anyway give us your comments we're gonna have a link in the show notes you can read the executive summary of the PDF is the thing to look at will call that out in the show notes take a look it's page nine we'll put that in the notes as well and just look at what they say that should be required of car makers or at least seriously urged of car makers and how that would change your car something you may have just paid good money for and maybe the car makers wouldn't do that anymore or worse what if they were told they had to unwind it next time you came in on a service call they had to disable it with a software update they can do that in fact there been questions asked on whether that would be the path or is everything old grandfather did in which case you might have a very valuable car all of a sudden if somebody wants the old I Drive that lets you do the more then maybe a 2014 I Drive could do so interesting topic and will be of course talking a lot about this you can also send us your voicemails on this as well by the way 866 what the hell's a number 86 6401 cnet 866 40 we have so many phone numbers on here 866 401 2638 call right now if you're listening on your get us get your phone out let us know what you think about these regulations that might be required okay tesla model x Wayne and I went down to LA last week and was it last week what day was that yeah that was that Thursday Thursday Timeflies that's right Antoine Antoine was here holding down the fort so we were down seeing the Model X which is their SUV basically or crossover is what it looks like and gull wing doors that's the first thing you see you go hey it's got gullwing doors aren't going doors as our Father sorry there's hook and wing doors and here's why they call them that if you're looking at our video version here you see that they kind of fold in the middle so as they come up they also fold across horizontally halfway or so up the door so they can become more compact this way they don't require so much room to lift and you can park in a normal space and not be trapped that's basically the idea um I think it's gonna happen I don't know I you know I think Tesla definitely wants it to happen and in the you know but this is essentially a concept car baby it's pretty finished they didn't call the concept car but yeah cameras for side view mirrors yeah that was way out there they say they want to do it but you know they might not be able to and then they are the crazy doors although they talked a lot about the functionality that they did really focus on the functionality of that and said this is the most accessible car the cart that's easiest to get into you the only as third row SUV that you can actually climb into the third row easily while you've got a baby seat in the second row exactly pointed that out as hello parents you want this car because I guess when you're not having kids I don't know if I guess when you got a kid in the second row and that seats all strapped in with belts you can't fold that seat forward you got to unloosen the child seat yeah clamor back there what a pain it's a nice looking thing if you haven't seen it it's kind of what Acura and Audi looking is that a fair that sure yeah or a fat jaguar ok there's Elon Musk sitting in the back of it in the photo we're looking at right now and that shows how you can actually get into the third row it's a bit of a shitty look like it's that easy to get out of that easy no it's not that easy it's like okay you can do it you're gonna hear your your back pop and crack a couple times you do it though but as opposed to climbing some of those third grow things in the SUV's that are out there it's it's definitely a lot yeah you can do it unlike a regular 2-door just gonna I wasn't there so yeah doesn't look that interesting to you well know in photos it just looks dumb it looks like Dorothy they're too many moving parts like a door is pretty simple you've got a hinge at one end of it or it's on a slider they're not a lot of moving parts but now you've got two hinges and things have got to come down to the right order and they've got to latch the bottom and of course somebody's gonna ask what happens when you roll over can't get that door oh yeah how does that work how's rollo that'll tell us that your status 85th LLS has like explosive bolts that's cool but I mean you know you roll over in this one everyone's got to crawl out of the front doors and they do have conventional front doors by the way the goal wings are just the second row / second and a half Rho and then the front doors or traditional hinged doors hinge at the front a traditional hatch in the back and by the way since there's no engine front or rear you have these two big deep cargo bays front and rear it's kind of like a giant version of what a Boxster has with a cargo bay in both ends but they're really big and they're crowing about how that makes for a really great crumple zone in the front mr. luggage up there to get crumpled in the crack right let's better get in a block in my lap I guess uh sorry oh one cool thing about this and you know one thing we are not really mentioning here it's an electric car yeah they didn't they didn't talk about that as much as you might think because they're kind of trying to move ahead saying okay it's also just a car right a usable everyday car but it is the same platform as the model s so a lot of specs that we would expect from that but one thing that's really cool i think about this is they mention it can be available with all-wheel drive so that means one electric motor in the front and one in the rear i was thinking about this a bit and it's kind of cool they talked about how they can adjust the torque across you know the axles yeah better traction and all that but unlike a car with a engine doing all-wheel drive and adjusting the torque back and forth it isn't shifting the torque it's just saying do we want a hundred percent torque at the front and one hundred percent torque at the rear or we can do it or do we want fifty percent of the front and a hundred percent it rear and I'm sure per wheel yeah you could know that it doesn't actually torque across the week oh it doesn't know no interesting okay can't do that it's just a single motor at each wheel they didn't know kind of a yeah there's no guy would want to add a gearbox to split the torque wheel to wheel that it'd be simpler differential you wouldn't be able to turn well they mentioned well yeah but they mentioned what they're using for things like traction obviously traction control and improving handling is in wheel breaking mm-hmm okay um but the but I think it's fascinating with scar can have two hundred percent torque right hundred percent on both ends yeah he kind of is too in a present or everything it'sit's you can basically turn this thing into to complete power trains both working one hundred percent of the time so could you cut it in half yes that's it and get casters the hardware store for the back and then you save half and then the price comes down to like 30 grand per car because now it's only half the price of the basement which we're guessing is about 60 it's so like Wayne said it's a model s basically underneath so it's going to have a ten to twelve percent reduction in range because it's a bigger vehicle to move through the air so the range on the model s would come down ten or twelve percent they're guessing and once it gets to production pricing should be similar 0 to 60 they expect in 4.4 seconds which as they like to crow is point for faster than the current carrera 911 you know all these little bullet points that they had to make it seem like it's a great SUV in a great sports car and has the space and the accessibility of a minivan which was their story about the folding doors that's a fast car I got a little quick ride in it yeah and the driver just hammered it and it had all that that locomotive push of an electric powertrain and no noise which always makes a car seemed faster yeah it's like wow how does that happen without a lot of growling then you've got to pull over and charge it whereas in the in the in that boys are you get to keep driving but you keep going but 300 miles range that's what they're on the top model maybe miles range when you're babying it yeah 300 miles range of doing zero to 60 runs at every way that's about a buck and a half if you do that and then you're charging lots yes for the big banner that's for the big battery which will be killing seven or something yeah lots of screens inside we've talked about the 17 inch LCD that's also got all stull video gauges and two like little ipod nano screens on the wheel to allow the buttons on the wheel to have almost unlimited functions I'll be soft buttons oh they'll be soft assigned hard buttons so anyway that's some of the tech in that one we've got all kinds of stuff if you haven't seen it already go to car tech dot cnet sorry cars dot cnet.com and you'll find our slideshow our video it's all up there just search model x it's easiest way to get to it okay uh washington state says if you drive an EV you should be punished a hundred dollars why is this road taxes this is sort of your EV road tax because normally the road maintenance is paid for by gasoline taxes electric cars don't use gasoline that's a problem yeah I think Washington state is getting a little too quickly out ahead of this problem right out other that may electric cars no and they're out they all use the you know the super eco tires which have very little impact you know they're designed for low friction sirloin so they're not going to do much the roadway and these cars are supposed to be light because they have to be yeah i don't i don't think yeah it's a little early you know it's like okay wait wait let psycho a cumulative problem i would say let's see what gas taxes in washington and see how many miles there recouping of gasoline car tax contribution by doing that Washington charges a steep I have this right now thirty seven and a half cents per gallon state tax that's correct that's way up there is that the highest in the country i think it might be that's part of why they're doing this look how much they rely on gas tax that is the highest in the country if i'm not mistaken no one else comes above 35 if I'm yeah Wow okay so they have a lot of gas tax revenue coming in in Washington State 37 I mean they're only basically saying they're only hitting you for about what is that three hundred and no geez do some math here a couple hundred miles worth of driving compared to a gas car so this is not a major recoup it's just a token recoup some owes have to turn to punish electric car drivers but it's not going to bring back the same amount of money that a gasoline car would do in the same year well it's like one of those things that like on paper probably makes sense like it's just a nominal fee yeah but then when you actually say it in public then it becomes like a why are you punishing us we're trying to save the entire thing where it's just like to the bean counters it's just an avi you're on the road it makes sense but then to the environmental it just seems like a tax on being green and it looks like like not much you know if you say it's a hundred bucks across a year of driving that's almost nothing and then you get the bill your registration arrived and it's a hundred dollars more than it was the year before see the thing about like taxes that are built into purchases is they're invisible to people so a lot of these people didn't even realize they were paying a gas tax they just knew they were buying right yeah it's just in the cost of its always bails tax like it's like you don't realize you're really paying it it's just something that happens yep and now you're gonna get a line item on your registration right as soon as you break it out as something else it's like you're not hurt yeah you look at and go what 1037 cent at a time / gallons nothing you know feel it and you're used to the price of gas yes it's it's a fairly stable thing except for you know a couple years ago by the way we have some good comments on this story actually some people did the math on on how much this would be equivalent to driving and we had one per 0 points out hundred dollars compares to 37 cents per gallon that's about 350 gallons of gasoline a year says about what ten Phillips or something like that 10 tanks alright so for a lot of folks that's my meme as little as eight weeks so I have a lot five weeks yeah depends if they drive a lot now something says an average of 15,000 miles a year 25 miles per gallon that's about two hundred twenty dollars 222 dollars per year in gas tax so hundred dollars isn't bad yes no matter what you're getting a discount yeah you're getting a discount on the same amount of tax you'd pay for driving those miles in a gasoline car but then the question is is it worth it then really a hundred dollars per electric car how many are there in Washington a few thousand right if you're only driving say you know 5,000 miles a year yeah if this is your second car yeah you're see your city commuter or whatever it yeah it seems to be not the time to do this it's almost like they're standing on principle and the principle is not admirable and all the cars are in high volume and some people are some of our commenters are also pointing out that sort of punishes the early EV adopters but the people drive in the 50 miles per gallon Priuses are getting away like gangbusters well yeah well it's interesting is there but they're paying that it's I'm going to do some numbers on this I'll do a little spreadsheet see what a Prius versus a low a low consumption gas engine versus a no volt leaf honda fit there are three or four viesturs some kind of a lice high mileage four-cylinder see who ends up coming off the best in terms of what you pay for the car and what you're gonna get stuck with in Washington it's like I don't want to like seem like that guy but it just seems a little whiny the whole like they're punishing me for love like come on we live in a society repay be punished on taxes all the time not a punishment is but it's what happens when you live in this country pay taxes for things like where do you think the roads come from if this is an attack Magic this is an assessment and this is the thing that people always grouse about on property taxes like okay I know my property taxes are X and they can't go beyond that it like in California with the loot rules we have so then they go they add assessments which are basically taxes but they're called something else and that's a dredge people crazy is it this basically an assessment on a particular behavior and it's discriminatory it some people that buy electric cars right I don't know I don't know if it's discriminatory it's just my fav the fingers just like I don't know if it is discriminatory or punishment or I don't even unfair it well that's it currently with the prices of electric cars you know they're high and people that are fairly well-to-do were buying them the hundred dollars isn't gonna make much different they're just like oh yeah sure it's not a lot of money over the year it's just it when it arrives as a new line item it's gonna work that that's like this is the equivalent of I own an iphone and iphone case cost thirty dollars but like a cheap gel case called five and you're punishing me for being and I feel like there's rights because I had to buy the case with the works with iphone sticker on it Apple tag totaling about that it is it's it's the price of privilege that's what it is if you have an iPhone or electric car you are in the ten percent at the very least all right way too much for something yes you're ready to submit a top dollar for a premium product all right well anyway that's where things are in let us know what you think about an electric cars substitution fake is that's been in the news before but I think Washington's the first state to do it boom there it is under bucks speaking of mileage really briefly here Honda lost this case is about a week and a half ago they lost a case on how they were stating the MPG of their hybrids that they were overstating the mileage you were going to get this was a suit brought by a vehicle owner that she used to I think she used to be in the carbons and is used to work at a car dealership which is kind of interesting and then she also had a law degree which I don't think she had used before as a lawyer or she'd retired or something anyway she's going back in the law profession which is an interesting sidebar cuz she's so stoked by her whim but anyway this is um where Honda was accused of overstating the mileage you would get in a hybrid and I'm surprised that it wasn't just so simple of is this what the EPA says or not why is this on Honda well it was what the EPA said they quoted the EPA's numbers yeah and they use that in their advertising and there is actually a class-action suit based on this as well the Honda sort of agreed to settle because it was cheaper to do that than fight it yeah but this woman decided to go on her own okay so she went separate of the class right and she went to small claims court this is sort of an interesting side note to the story and a lot of she had a lot of support i think amongst the public amongst the internet public because she was you know fighting Goliath on her own taking the small plane claims court he's erin honda fit of it yeah and she could win like ten thousand dollars you know in small claims court now the rules in california small claims courts say that you can't bring a lawyer well so that's where her past legal background helped her out yeah she's not officially a lawyer and honda could not bring a lawyer so they had sent one of their engineering guys to say well the EPA said this and is not going to go with oh no is it the marketing guy they say you're the engineer you got us on the marketing guy to spin it engineering guy showed up with a chart like everyone knows likely go all right so she made 90 867 bucks yeah although hot is gonna appeal this they want to actually have you know lawyers argue this out and stuff like this because this could actually have a huge impact on the auto industry as a whole yeah if they're saying these EPA numbers they can't use those which you know i mean it's it's an estimate it's a test I mean it seems legitimate hyundai's next because a 40 miles per gallon on how much every car we test and they very rarely get anywhere near that then the interesting thing here though is that if the EPA number is all they're quoting and that got him into hot water what are they supposed to say yeah I mean unless they just can really have to emphasize your mileage may vary yours just like you start putting an asterisk next to it with a this is what it's been tested at yeah but this is not necessarily an assertion that this is what you would you like another paragraph at the bottom of the ad is what you're gonna get the future is like you know you look down that like to point type it's at the bottom of the ads gonna be like another paragraph well what I heard her evidence was when she went to small claims court is she had photographs of her trip computer in the honda okay and she and she under that as evidence you know there's not much evidence in small claims court apparently and so honda the rep I talk to you they were just saying like you know we'd like to see better evidence there should be some independent testing something to show this rather than just a few photographs of for transmuter remember that like back when the the current generation of fit first came out people were asserting that the trip computer is a little generous oh yeah a small 4 gallon estimate and they don't actually do an empty tank you know you get your receipt you look at the miles you drove and you do the math it comes out like maybe two or three percent maybe even as much as ten percent like high yeah on the trip computer yeah and I heard like yeah 55 miles per gallon hi yeah and you know somewhat some of it will depend on polling time like is that a really a full tank average or is you know does the trip computer take segments and shows you the last little so is this an argument between epa and what her trip computer showed or EPA and what her own calculations of pump Phillips she just use the trip either she didn't have she didn't even have a log so the trip computer versus epa and trip computer said it you got a lot less mileage yeah well as we know that always happens there's like very instant speedometer he tells if you hook a GPS device up to your car you'll find your speedometers about 2 or 2 25 miles per hour fast and the faster you go the more often walking it yeah it's a gear thing the gear is not perfectly precise that's driving a little magnetometer looking in Subaru now and this I think it's just a coincidence but I'm looking at their subaru impreza site and they're stating up to 27 36 is their new language for MPG a little bit of couching there i don't think this is tied to the honda thing this is business up before that but that might be the kind of language we start seeing it a lot of car makers is up to right EPA numbers you might get this hey you might even get more I've seen more occasions your cheesy good luck with that yeah we never see a car and that males the EPA not as well never seen a manufacturer under under states like Libya they always they want to like each every little bit of marketing opportunity how they can every ounce going from what gets good gas mileage to what keeps running new numbers just came out this week from JD Power you know they have all kinds of studies they do this one is the vehicle dependability study this one is the long-term not the 90 days how many bugs did your car have but this is the i believe three years how many problems is you have in that long period of time and what they found is that there's an average of a hundred and thirty-two problems per hundred vehicles so over three years a lot of vehicles didn't have any reported problems at least a large minority of them didn't have any problems but who came in number one was now lexus which used to be way at the top and was number one for a while and dropped down its lexus porsche caddy toyota scion are your top five and those are all well better than the average again these are owner reported numbers yeah this is not where they're doing hard research and so let's see who did the worst cuz that's the fun part of this story number uh let's see uh count them down from five on up fifth suckiest is jaguar that's right ram jeep dodge chrysler except for jag it's all us in your marking on these brands boom boom boom boom boom that's not good that's not good i mean you could afford to God want Ford and GM went to a press release on this I just keep wanting to put eagle at the bottom is like dodge chrysler jeep right right yeah the a.m seal around right also kind of low but not at the bottom Oh many is not as bad as it was consumer reports that many second to worst in their version of this study this one puts many below average in terms of quality wood dependability but not not at the bottom anyway i'll have a link to this too if you want to see where your car falls and HD radio still not going anywhere what was the old Saturday Night Live line so and so it's still dead who was that Oh help me that was the general well Franco Franco okay it's still dead HD ratio stilted it's just ain't going anywhere you don't care about HD radio I'm gonna stop mentioning in the videos I don't think anyone cares I've seen it popping up in more cars actually but I don't think anybody really think anybody cares yeah it's not a buying point bill really is that car have HD radio cuz I want that whatever that is it's like nice to have it's yeah it isn't car and got it and it's like oh nice and I think it's nicer anywhere but the Bay Area and seattle where a mountainous terrain raises hell with it and it comes in and out all the time here as our transmitter signals are bouncing off of mountains and buildings we get lots of multipath and HD rios a hell of a time with that and so you're going from HD two non HD and that's worse than having no HD were you just your ears get you because it does an a/b comparison all the time and you are constant being reminded oh yeah FM sucks the most if you just had FM you wouldn't compare it to anything but FM sucks but you want to do that as you much but you wouldn't know that as much if you didn't have something really clean coming in about ten percent of the time and got oh that's what it could set oh god did so this is research done by mark casse often company it's a research company they found that in 08 sixty-seven percent of people had heard of HD radio now just fifty four percent difference they forgot or a lot of them died in two thousand eight twenty one percent said it delivers better sound now twenty percent say so that's gone backwards in two thousand eight eight percent could say yes it has more channels and more choices and that recognition number hasn't moved at all this is a mess and seven percent in the first survey said HD Radio is actually the same as satellite radio at least now only six percent like that what a mess it's just that the yay HD radio I don't think I don't think it's gonna what's gonna go anywhere yeah it's you know FM radio nobody really cares how good it is if you listen FM you just like you just want to have something on yeah it's not what you want in terms of programming yeah so who cares if it sounds better you know last thing we got here for we go on the road forward is got sync available in more cars let's see what do we have for 2013 like a fusion asian fusion and edge thing Oh flex yeah flex so they're just making it standard it used to be optional and it was a pretty cheap option I mean 200 you know 300 x or something and now they're they're making it standard in in both fusion and flex and okay so they won't get the revenue stream off that but kinda we're thinking maybe they're competing with Kia and Hyundai and Kia and Hyundai are putting those types of functions standard in their cars yeah so they're thinking we got to keep ahead of them all right that's starting with the 2012 fusion if i'm not mistaken not even waiting for the new redesigned 2013 if i read that right so this should be taking effect like right away so next time you go shop for a fusion reflects it should have sink if it was you know built from like this point forward and if it doesn't just pay the three and advice get the damn thing it's worth it totally worth it no like haggle it out of your dealer right make them pay put it in there and tell them I hear it's coming standards so here I am coming in to help you and buy a car now when you need money yeah to close the month you know Papa 200 bottle of bourbon yeah it to me and then keep the rest hey everybody gets their beak wet on this one everybody ok let's go on the road it's a Subaru that is part of their sometimes confusing line of impressiveness let's take let's go for a ride the 2012 subaru impreza 2.0 i sport limited and see what this car is all about check it out we've got a downsized engine here it's smaller than the previous generation of subaru impreza ya know these days like a two and a half later now it's like a 22 point 0 liter right still a flat floor boxer engine because that's kind of Subarus trademark and their other trademark being they're symmetrical all-wheel drive system right which this car still comes with standard what's interesting is that we also have a CVT in this vehicle I think the first time Subarus used that I've started to roll it out through their cars in the last couple years but it's pretty recent and I think it might be the first time in the Impreza yeah every was a big deal in this car was launched last year at one of the european motor shows where they said they were going to be putting a CVT instead of a traditional automatic transmission much like the the smaller engine it to get better you'll efficiency out of it and if I mean in my limited drive not that bad of a CVT either yeah and the kind of whole point of this cbt am the smaller engine is to get better fuel mileage and this thing is rated at 27 miles per gallon city 33 I think maybe 36 highway I haven't seen quite that I barely got it over 27 and some extended freeway driving so not sure how realistic those numbers are I think it would take some significant baby ya think but then as far as like cabin tech I don't really have much going on here right there is a USB port for iphone or for iPod connectivity and put a USB Drive in there with some music bluetooth icon here I'm assuming that means we have hands-free calling do we have audio streaming yeah and this is actually one of the best bluetooth audio streaming setups I've seen because it will actually show full track information on the radio display you know it has the usual limitations you could only like skip tracks and pause it but then it also has the full bit of information which a lot of system's don't show they don't show you any like song title or anything but this would like to show you everything so that's that's pretty cool interesting ok so this car was first and foremost cheap 21 Grand delivered for the base model actually 17 for the very base model really yeah then that but over the deal if you get away from the two point oh I sport premium thing yeah but still I mean the engine and the transmission well it base is a 5-speed manual yep and then but it still has that that 2-liter engine boxer engine and the all-wheel drive too yeah the all-wheel drive is what makes it a screaming deal if you need that at all and a lot of folks you know living the weather where you do most of the country does and my first thought about this car when I start driving it and I might have mentioned it in that video to is why wouldn't you buy this car if you're in the during the market for it for a compact Civic what an elantra what Chevy Cruze you got to put this on your list that sound that sounds like an advertisement but I was very surprised by a look at 17 495 if you don't get any premium or limited or any of those nights for trims and I has four-wheel drive real four-wheel drive these guys do a good job of serious all-wheel drive that will get you out of trouble not just help you a corner faster had some fun with that because i found a little gravel track and was doing some good that's a circular racetrack in there and and feeling it you know as the back would start to let out the front would cling on you know and I was yeah it was keeping on track and it was fun to drive it like that too was a blast it was a fun driving little car for one that isn't expensive it isn't a driver's car you know one that has all that all the BS and all the price to go with it it's not all that powerful either keep using the word fun for as a cbt in it not a bad CVT but not a bad cv2 but i would i would have preferred we had the available with a manual we didn't get that we got the CBT car so that added a thousand dollars by the way and has little paddles which are really silly on a CVT at least if you've got cogs give me paddles maybe I'm stimming the whole concept of like fate gears I hate that hurts me just don't give me they'll give you a shift gate with a cbt yeah just shift I mean III don't mind there being two modes a sport mood yet drive moves that's more than just transmit don't pretend like they're gears there you're completely doing a disservice to the technology in the vehicle right the technology is kind of moment being making it spend time doing what it's not yeah make me pretend to be a geared transmission let it behave like what it is here's my counter point to that is that putting it in manual mode and I was driving on some wet roads it was stormy that week and I was writing you know drive around these like twisty roads are all soaked up you know wet and everything and I'd lock it in third locking in its virtual third gear yeah and hold it there and that was third gear but it work you know kept the kept a constant you know ratio and constant rpm which you don't get with the CVT the RPMs all over the road on these guys yeah I mean the idea of the CVT is that is supposed to hit one rpm and just hang there they never do but that's the thing it's like you know if you are doing a zero to 60 run in a cbt every time you virtually shift you interrupt the power there you're already not getting like optimal power to the ground you get the drivetrain losses of the CVT system so like if you can put it in sport mode and then just have the engine just sit at wherever its maximal with it about put it yeah you know then then you you don't lose that power for that couple of seconds where you and then have to get back up to that point in the power of n you actually end up going faster in a CVT then you would without one if they would just stop trying to pretend like it's a regular transition if you're out with your CVT car and you're doing zero to 60 runs and you're writing them down and comparing them you bought the wrong call it's a CVT it's supposed to be kind of easy and it has sacrifices yeah and it's for fuel economy mostly it mostly I mean it's it's a bucket in the sweet spot staying in that three thousand to four thousand ish rpm range all the time you know kind of hover there where the gas engines happy oh it's a two-point that's a two liter box you guys pointed out it came down from 2.4 2.4 yeah yeah or five I think it was two and a half two and a half and still good numbers for a very small motor 148 horse hundred forty five foot pounds of torque and gets 2736 with the CVT that better MPGs with the CVT you get less if you go with the manual and you have a huge difference in 0 to 60 you add a second and a half with the CVT so yeah it's not the WRX no that's the thing people mix up impreza with impreza WRX and the interesting thing is if you buy 2012 in w RX or 2012 STI it's the old chassis yeah they haven't bumped this new model up to the the if you they have bumped the WRX and STI mileage as a chassis and instead of just not filling them this year they just are still continuing to manufacture the old model yeah it's one of those messy two cars under the same name plate but there are totally different underpinnings from the only talk of the next WRX actually just being completely different vehicle they haven't stated whether they're going to just make a WRX version of this chassis or if they're just going to diverge the tube it would be good for them to clarify that I know people that drive a WRX know all about them it's a specialist it's a mainstream specialty car but there's a lot of other folks I think that are looking and not clear about this is an impressive and impreza WRX and STI is also neighbors or anybody call a WRX and imprisoned WRX nobody says that but it says on the band when you're when you're in the showroom it says impreza and the little we'd like says like oh yeah my impression of your interview imperfect yeah it's so great nobody knew just say my debut intercooler on my super impreza WRX that doesn't get said no what are your what about your impreza WRX STI other notes on this car is um let's see we talked about it you can only get if i'm not mistaken a non navigation head unit i think it can in the anything that's did oh I don't know there was a weird mixture in those the sport premium doesn't come with nav you can't option nav on it if you go to the very top the limited or something yeah then you can option it I've always kind of curious by car makers that make you go to the very top trim to then give them more money it's like why don't you let me be a fool and buy a mid-range car and then option it up to as much or more than your high range car let me have more flexibility because when I'm comfortable as a consumer with choice I'll spend more money they tend to say by the top end or just spend less money it's like let me spend more money on any model I want because it's easier from rolling off the assembly line that way sue you if your configuration like I don't want to have to like build half of these like sports yeah that's so much work for a global auto maker with like you know eight thousand mainframe computers that could figure this out it's not a matter of whether it's more work or whether the canner can't do it it's a matter of we make more money if it costs us less to me yeah I'm sure they're being counters have looked at it and said no this is the strategy we're gonna get better average you know revenue per car but other car makers do the opposite they'll let you option anything in any model so one of them that's also the reason like a nav system to BWW set seven thousand dollars could you have to pay somebody to put it in there and why be and why they the coffee beige shift lever in a 911 is four hundred dollars cuz choice costs money my favorite option is the ceramic buttons OMW yes ceramic button what does that do it like 600 bucks for those yeah ceramic knob and the buttons around the eye dr knob absurd you can upgrade the audio system piece by piece i found this interesting 10 inch sub 500 additional pair of tweeters on top of the tweeters 120 and upgraded speakers in all the same positions no more but just better 249 yeah i think those are our dealer accessory upgrade or installed which surprised me for those kind of price points yeah let's have a thing that's I wish you'd pay just go to bestbuy right so I mean if you can get the dealer to do it and it doesn't void your warranty on your stereo system go for it do it yeah one thing that's interesting here too we have the sport premium model and that had the sort of the standard radio display yeah at the sport limited they actually have an expanded display a display audio kind of thing where they show you more information on your radio so not a color LCD just a bigger monochrome I think it actually might be color i'm not sure doc said not a big screen still a ribbon type shape slightly bigger more like a three by five kind of thing interesting yeah i got a lot of displays in this car the one we had a bigger one a big one yeah this makes me nuts I want to I want simple and I want now and yeah they should you know this whole like expanded display audio type of screen they should have brought that down to the the lower level to i would think I mean if something's called sport premium premium it means something yeah this car was called premium and sport did the sport ok let's EDT and didn't work me aware usually means nothing nothing it means a harder ride and stiffer suspension whatever that means this is for tunes disappointed in it that's right i didn't me it's stiff for me the sport tune or two who is stiffer will be meaningful anyway that's the subie of the the 2012 impreza it is a new version of that car it is to most eyes more attractive can we agree on that I think it looks the same Renee I think it looks better in person than it does in any video or photograph I thought looking walk around this car to appreciate it I thought look pretty good and it also there was one of the things that they changed on this that was interesting they got rid of the oh yeah so yeah so that the styling is freshened and then of course the engine is smaller but the mpg is better significantly better it used to be kind of like a rotary engine car a technical Marvel but a pig he used to get 20 27 with the old engine and now as we mentioned it's getting what was it again 27 36 big happens when you go for a smaller engine yeah big that's a huge jump in there di in them no no not yet I don't think there's any boxer with di yet the-the-the tudo di that's going to be in the oh the food toyota scion e di n court injective yeah that's not the same car even that same engine even though it's a two liter oh it's just a box it's a completely different okay well it still should be a hot motor yeah all right folks that's the that's that's the car we got for the road this week let suits in the connect car tech garage so let's see we just rolled out the wrangler jeep wrangler rubicon got it good and muddy Thank You Antoine for turning us onto your mud bog it doesn't look the same now i'll have you know but you'll see you next time you're there and the range rover evoque very interesting that's probably one of the most requested cars from you our viewers and listeners I've ever seen emails on a lot of folks asking what are you gonna review the Evoque is the review up review is yet up went up yesterday okay I think our video went up yesterday or it goes up today so both of those should be up now or by the time you hear the show if you're catching us after we post up next we have this on the new honda crv the 2012 is in right now the new Buick LaCrosse and the Camry Hybrid which I didn't know we had in so we got that too huh good grief okay another busy week coming up alright that's it for car tech live you know how to find us show notes car tech dot C netcom let us don't you think about the new proposed regulations from the feds to strip a lot of tech out of cars and email is easy car tech at cnet com voice mail 866 401 cnet let us know your thoughts and find us on Twitter it's Brian Cooley all one word Wayne WWAY for an e how do you mmm it sounds like a like a like a traction control system before silent before silent yeah way with a silent for you guess where it is and it GU is antwan a NT g 00 and we'll see you next week you