2007 Audi S4 Cabriolet Convertible 2-door 4.2l on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Mystery shoppers love Infiniti, hate Tesla

Infiniti, followed by Lexus tied with Mercedes-Benz took the top two spots for best sales experience according to mystery shoppers from the latest Pied Piper Prospect Satisfaction Index, while EV manufacturer Tesla recorded the lowest overall score. Not surprisingly, premium brands dominated the top ranks. Including the three already mentioned, luxury brands occupied seven of the top ten spots and included Audi, BMW, Porsche, and the only American brand to crack the upper echelon, Cadillac. Toyota, Volkswagen, and Nissan rounded out the first ten positions. The news for domestic automakers isn't good. Aside from Caddy, the only other star-spangled automaker to score above the industry average is Chrysler. The rest of FCA, most of GM, and all of Ford fell below the line. But Pied Piper's mystery shoppers handed Tesla the biggest walloping – the company is ten full points below the next lowest brand, Volvo, and its score of 86 is 17 below the average of 103. It's baffling, considering the company's touted direct-sales model. "Tesla leaves me scratching my head," Fred O'Hagan, Pied Piper's president and CEO, told Wards Auto. "They own all of their stores, so you would think each one would be doing the same thing. But they're not. Tesla is consistent in its inconsistencies." O'Hagan added that there's a "huge variation" in Tesla's store-to-store effectiveness, and that in some cases, shoppers found showroom workers that acted more like "museum curators," Wards Auto reports. It might be popular to call Tesla the Apple of the car world, but based on Pied Piper's work, the brand has a long way to go to emulate the uniform shopping experience of an Apple Store. The news might be bad for Tesla, but even for the brands that scored below average, there's cause for celebration. Only Tesla and Mini lost points in this year's rankings, and only Mercedes and Lincoln held steady. Every other brand, including Infiniti, which topped the index for the first time, gained at least one point. The biggest improvements belong to Porsche, Land Rover, and Mitsubishi, which all jumped five points. Pied Piper's annual Prospect Satisfaction Index uses mystery shoppers – over 6,100 this year – from across the country to assess dealers and generate rankings from over 50 individual factors. News Source: Pied Piper via WardsAuto Green Audi BMW Cadillac Chrysler Infiniti Lexus Mercedes-Benz Nissan Tesla Toyota Car Buying Car Dealers study

Audi RS Q3 gets snarlier, hits 62 mph in 4.8 seconds [w/video]

Well, that was quick. A mere 20 months after its debut at the 2013 Geneva Motor Show, Audi has issued a fairly significant update to its RS Q3 crossover. A light exterior refresh - the most noticeable change is that the grille surround and headlights are now joined - belies more significant changes under the compact crossover's hood.
Power from the 2.5-liter, turbocharged five-cylinder has been boosted nicely from 310 horsepower to 340, while torque has jumped from 309 pound-feet to 332 lb-ft. The result of this extra thrust is that the tiny CUV can now scamper to 62 miles per hour in a seriously quick 4.8 seconds, rather than the original RS Q3's 5.5-second sprint. A new fifth-generation multi-plate clutch is fitted to the seven-speed S-tronic dual-clutch transmission, which Audi claims will now deliver even quicker shifts.
Lighter brake rotors with ridiculous eight-piston calipers in the front provide what we imagine is a lot of stopping power, while Audi continues to offer an optional adaptive damper system. 19-inch wheels are standard while 20s are optional.

Audi's CES interior concept foretells a screen-filled A8

Audi is once again offering a glimpse into its future interior-design plans at CES. The new setup is called Virtual Dashboard and is both an extension and an evolution of Virtual Cockpit, which made its debut in Vegas two years ago before winding up in the TT. While this interior mockup is pulled from Audi's recent E-Tron Quattro concept, our man on the ground at CES was told this is "very close" to the interior we'll see in the next Audi A8, which is due in a year or so. Virtual Dashboard is screen-heavy in stark contrast to Virtual Cockpit's single, driver-focussed gauge display. It keeps that and adds a pair of screens to the mix, all of them using OLED (organic light-emitting diode) tech. The central screen measures 14.1 inches diagonally and is curved with a rhomboid border; its AMOLED (active matrix organic light-emitting diode) allows for the irregular shape and curvature. Below that sits a more normal, rectangular screen; both are very well integrated into their surroundings. And as in many current Audis, the shift lever acts as a comfy wrist rest. On the top screen, drivers and passengers get what Audi calls classic information – navigation, audio, settings. The lower screen provides big favorite buttons and also houses on-screen buttons for the climate control. When it's called for, the lower display turns into an input tablet for handwritten entries, an evolution of the small separate touchpad offered in current Audis. The displays use swiping and other gestures familiar to smartphone users, which allow them to interact with each other, for example when swiping to accept a call and move its info to the gauge display. The screens provide haptic feedback that goes beyond what automakers are offering today. Our man at CES says button presses only result from deliberate presses of the screen, meaning you can rest a finger over your selection and it won't activate until you press, just like a real button. Novel. The steering-wheel controls also provide haptic feedback and have been simplified compared to what's on Virtual Cockpit today. When it hits production in the A8 and other vehicles, all of this will be built on the next generation of Audi's infotainment platform, which it's creatively calling MIB2+. It offers more computing power than the current MIB2 system, allowing it to run more displays and offer more connected services over an LTE connection.