Cars.com's Joe Wiesenfelder takes a look at the 2011 Infiniti M37. It competes with the Mercedes-Benz E-Class and BMW 5 Series.
Transcript
<v Announcer>Cars.com auto review. Hi, I'm Joe Wiesenfelder with cars.com. We're taking a look at the 2011 Infiniti M37. That's their mid-size rear wheel drive luxury sedan. It's been redesigned for this year.
A lot of things have changed, including the exterior styling, which is kind of Japanese looking very infinity. It's not everyone's taste. Some people love it. We'll concentrate here on what has changed for 2011. Some of the highlights and low lights, definitely a highlight. The interior quality has improved a great deal. The materials are nice, the leather is high quality. Some of the things like this foe metal looks pretty convincing. Some of these things though are options, including the leather clad gauge hood here, a suede like headliner material, and also this silver powdered ash wood, replacing a regular wood trim. Some people like this, couple of riders would do, I'm not too crazy about it. Now, I like the seats, real comfortable in the sport edition of this car. They're actually more bolstered. These are nice and comfortable, if you're not into the sport thing. I do find the controls really hard to reach with the door closed. On this car happens to have the optional navigation system, which is an eight inch screen. Interesting, you can't really reach the screen while you're driving that's why the knobs here, but if you want to enter a city name, for example, for the navigation system, you can use the touchscreen. I think that's really good to have. And while you're driving, you're better off using the controller knob instead of trying to reach the screen. I'd prefer if it were closer instead of here, maybe here, but there's something else here. This is the infinity drive mode select knob. And what it does is let you choose from four different modes for the way the drive train responds. There's snow, which I'm not talking about because it's too nice out and I don't want to think about it. Eco, which is the economy mode, regular and sport. Now what it does is it changes the responsiveness of the pedal, how quickly the transmission shifts and downshifts and also comes with an optional feature called eco pedal, which actually varies the resistance of the accelerator. So while you're stepping down, it pushes back to remind you not to accelerate too quick. I gotta be honest, this stuff gets to be so intrusive. The car is a bit of a nag. I would end up turning it off, but then why are you paying for the option? If you have to go ahead and turn it off. Another quick pro and con about the incident, the backseat is nice and roomy, now, ostensibly, it holds three people back here. I have to say, though, the setter with this giant floor hump here, well, it would not be particularly comfortable. And then the downer here is the trunk at 14.7 cubic feet is actually kind of small for a car this big. Now, again, check out the full review at cars.com for more details. In general, the 2011 M37 is a good choice, especially with 333 horsepower and it's V6. It's more powerful than the outgoing V8 version, more than enough power for most ends up being a good and somewhat cheaper alternative to the E-Class Mercedes and the BMW five series. (upbeat music) <v Announcer>For more car related news, go to cars.com or our blog KickingTires.net.
