Gadgetory

in the 1990s when I was a boy and a family wants to transport more than the average 2.4 children around the car of choice would have been an egg-shaped MPV like a renault megane or a Ford Galaxie these days however and more and more families are going for the SUV and Audi it would seem spells SUV with a cue to cue 7 tops out the cue range for Audi as its flagship SUV model and this year there's a brand new one out on the market the second generation offers to be lighter more efficient more powerful more comfortable more everything really we're here in the beautiful Swiss landscape with a couple of hours behind the wheel of the new q7 to find out what's what and because this is a popular car it sold over 500,000 so far and because you might be considering one to ferry around your 72 kids here's our list of our favorite features weight is an important thing when building a car or rather the lack thereof and this car has shifted over 325 kilos from its previous version for then to context 325 kilos that's well I'd like to say that's four of me it's closer to three but it still means three full-grown men you're not shifting about it's also the weight of a grand piano I already tell me now I don't think many people have been shifting that around in the back of a car but you have to imagine it has to affect the handling it's brought the 0 to 60 to time down by over a second it's pushed up the top speed by 10% it's made fuel efficiency better it's incredible to think that much weight could have been shifted but it affects so many aspects of the car it makes a huge difference Howdy's new in-car entertainment system features apple carplay connectivity and Android auto which means that no matter what phone you have you can integrate it right into the car that's a massive leap forward considering that in-car entertainment systems have classically been pretty rubbish when everyone just prefers to use their phone now that you can integrate that straight in and use all the functionality in your favorite apps that's a huge win and one less thing that the car manufactures have to think of Audi has been moving away from the rounded look that's been dominating its lineup for so long and it's adding in this more creased sharp aggressive look across its entire range we see it in the new r8 we see it in the new TT and we're seeing it here in the new q7 Howdy's SUVs to me have always looked more like jacked-up estate cars but for a company that makes the rs6 that is a compliment this new creased sharp look is a modern incarnation of that era we hold so dearly from Audi that of the original Quattro those sharp eighties lines the Giugiaro age of design is coming back and it looks better than ever the price now that's not something we usually focus on here ex car but about 50 thousand pounds and change on the road it's not a bad prospect when you compare it to other cars in the sector especially considering its fuel economy and speed you've actually got yourself quite a good deal and for that money you're still getting an Audi driver assists now definitely they seem to be coming into a world to take away from us the pleasure of driving and for that we will never forgive them our robot overlords will stealers of every last joy of driving at some point and we will curse them to our dying day 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 and adjust so basically it adjusts your acceleration braking and steering 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 now self-driving cars might seem like there are a few years away but apparently this year you can get in an Audi q7 for almost everything I would want to do on a day-to-day basis in a car maybe those robot overlords aren't so bad after all the new q7 will launch with a 3 liter TDI engine kicking out 268 brake horsepower connected to an 8-speed Tiptronic gearbox now that will fall short of sports car credentials but add in the weight reduction and that gives you one hell of a power-to-weight ratio Interiors for me the most overlooked part of car design and we've talked about how he's looking a little bit past their best even in the top level or eighths for quite some time now this new q7 though has updated everything and it just looks that little bit more updated that little bit more modern that little bit more swish now this display here I'm usually not a fan of displays that feel like they've been bolted onto the dash of complained about it on Mercedes in the past but this one actually feels really nice and elegant and the screen is super high resolution it's a nice little touch instead of old-fashioned analog mechanical dowels you're presented with them awesome screen which you can configure to have exactly the information you want up there you can have virtual dials up and present or as we have right now the dials are pushed to the side and reduced in size to give me a nice high definition map of where we are now of them you with a sat-nav marry that to the heads-up display that's hovering about five yards in front of me and you've got yourself a very very efficient way of me not having to take my eyes off the road which frankly in these incredibly winding mountain roads in Switzerland is no bad thing it might not be a major point but if you're driving at night or Andes through a tunnel the little interior strip lights come on blue in this case animation look like you're driving something out of Tron which in anyone's book is pretty damn awesome now this is obviously an SUV which means I'm higher off the ground than I like to be normally in a car and it's bigger and heavier than I normally like to have in a car even with the 300 plus kilos shedded so handling well handling is like an SUV but within that that shedded weight does make a difference it is its lightest in its class and it uses that to its full advantage to make it feel a little bit more nimble the high seating position they'll definitely remind you that you're in an SUV now that might not be your taste certainly isn't mine but if you like that kind of thing you get the best of both worlds something that feels light but still gives you that high driving mighty position on the road now modern cars are modern cars and they all feel pretty good Odie's are at the top of that tree in any case this has the 8-speed Tiptronic gearbox which is as smooth as you like and frankly right now although a manual gearbox would always be my preferred way of getting forward at the moment I'm rocking an injured knee so I'm not having to use my left foot is actually a God set there's obviously the flappy paddle gearbox for those of you still want to shift themselves or this big old chunky stick down here can be used to shift gear as well but frankly put it in Drive and point it in the right direction and that's the way you're going to treat this car 99% of the time this is a family transport car and no matter how many extra sporty touches they want to add in how many more aggressive styling touches the truth of the matter is you're going to be taking the kids to school in this every day you're not going to be taking it round the Nurburgring of the weekends that's not what this car is for those little sporty touches are just there to make you feel a little bit better about resigning yourself to the fact that shifting your family around is now your primary concern when you get behind the wheel SUVs are good at two very particular things fairing a lot of stuff or a lot of people and if people ferrying is the reason you've bought this car at no extra cost it's available with seven seats where some of the boot is sacrificed to put two extra full seats in the back all of which can be fitted for child seats so you could be ferrying around six children in this car and the driver seven if you teach your child how to drive which I highly recommend though you have it our top list of things we think you need to know about the brand-new Audi q7 these swiss out roads have been a brilliant proving ground for this car and I'll tell you what volvo BMW even porsche you can have to take note