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Video: Nissan Forum Concept

02:01 min
By Cars.com Editors
May 13, 2009

About the video

Cars.com's Joe Wiesenfelder takes a look at the Nissan Forum concept car at the 2008 Chicago Auto Show.

Transcript

(upbeat music) Step back, the minivan's angry. This is the Nissan Forum. Nissan continues to try and make minivans look cool. I don't know, they might be wasting their time, but this one is more about what's inside than what's outside.
Now, the idea behind the Forum is audio zones. All the Bose speakers are built in to the seats, so no matter where you are, the audio stays with you. The center console raises up to allow the seats in the second row to squeeze toward each other here, and they turn sideways and can stay that way, though, I don't know if that's the safest way to do it. This is an access setting to help you get into the third row, and they also face all the way back, and the captain's chair separate again. Before it was developed with Bose, which put it in a pretty interesting two zone system, for one thing, the interface up here is clever, it seems to be a little bit like an iPod. If you turn the outer collar here, you can go to different letters of the alphabet, and then select within there with the center knob, and maybe you'll find something you like. The idea here is this is a two zone system, the front seats are the front video zone, and then there's a second video zone that covers the second and third rows of seats. You push one button, you can see the second row, push the second button, and you see the third row. There's an unofficial third zone, and that is when the sliding door is open, they expose speakers right here, there's one on either side, and that is your tailgating zone. Now, if you've seen one that's misbehaving back there, and you wanna get them in line, you can hit the time out button on the steering wheel, you push it. What it does is turns off their audio zone, picks up your voice, amplifies it, and you can say something like, "Don't make me come back there." Now originally, Nissan had planned for carbon monoxide to route up from the exhaust system and not the little suckers out back there, but then the lawyers determined that that would be murder. <v Narrator>For additional information on this car or any other, go to cars.com and our blog KickingTires.