versa

When you think subcompact, you're probably thinking giving up horsepower, cargo space, tech options, and safety. But this isn't so for the 2012 Hyundai Accent.

The new Accent comes in a smart four-door GLS spec and a sporty five-door hatch, in GS and SE trims. With a direct-injection 1.6-liter four-cylinder engine, the Accent offers 138 horsepower at 6,300rpm and 123 pound-feet of torque at 4,850rpm.

The Accent four-door is slightly larger than its predecessor (3.5 inches longer and a wheelbase that's 2.8 inches longer). It also bests the Toyota Yaris, Ford Fiesta, … Read more

It's not very often that we find ourselves talking about Nissan's entry-point vehicle, the compact Versa, but the current generation, while a bit spartan for a tech car, is well-made and inexpensive. It's also due for replacement.

Late last year, Nissan released a sketch illustrating the design direction for the Versa's next iteration, and now Car and Driver reports on a hunch that the recently revealed Nissan Sunny sedan is our best bet for what to expect from a 2012 Versa, which Car and Driver expects to be announced at this year's New York auto … Read more

Getting to the bottom of the Chevy Volt fiasco, beaming your iPod screen on your dash, the littlest Aston Martin gets a green light, and the world's most advanced driving simulator.

• Is the Chevy Volt a fraud, or just unfairly parsed?

• iPhone as radar detector

• The Prius will get a bigger sibling

• 10 concept cars that got lost in translation

• Pioneer shows laser-based HUD

For years, style was absent without an excuse from American subcompacts. But the days of slab-sided, no-frills hatchbacks may soon be history.

For decades, something was missing in the small cars designed, built and sold in the United States. It was gone for so long that most American consumers probably didn't know what it was.

But to Ralph Gilles, Chrysler Group's chief designer, the missing ingredient was obvious. U.S. subcompacts lacked emotional appeal.

"Small cars of the past were not necessarily done with passion," he said.

Generations of Detroit designers seemed to say: No one buys a small car for its styling, so why bother? Uninspired, appliancelike econoboxes? What else did you expect?

American subcompacts had none of the attributes found in the cool, quirky and even elegant small cars created elsewhere in the world, from the original BMC Mini to the first Peugeot 205 to the modern Citroen C3.

U.S. automakers were forced to churn out small cars to raise corporate average fuel economy averages, so they could keep selling big trucks. Small-car design? An oxymoron.

But consumer preference has shifted -- the result of higher gasoline prices, new fuel-efficiency standards and concern about climate change.

"Small cars and vehicles powered by four-cylinder engines have been on a steady increase since 2004," said Ford Motor Co. sales analyst George Pipas.

U.S. fleets must average 35.5 mpg by 2016, compared with 25.3 mpg this year. Combined with stricter emissions standards, it means the number of small-car nameplates for sale in the United States will increase.

And when a market segment gets crowded, automakers must rely on styling to set their vehicles apart from the crowd.

"It's not business as usual for small cars here anymore," said Moray Callum, Ford Motor's design director for cars.

The expanding lineup of new small cars means styling will get a lot more creative and appealing, just as it did with mid-sized cars recently. (Think of the modern Chevrolet Malibu, the new Ford Taurus and the current Toyota Camry and Honda Accord.)… Read more

VersaTimer aims to keep users on schedule with a generous clock face and some added features. Users of all skill levels will find it a reliable tool for staying on track of multiple tasks at once.

This free program appears as an enormous digital clock face with red numbers. Below the cycling numbers are large buttons for starting and resetting the clock. The upper left of the clock face has a pull-down menu that lets users select different clock presets. Within the clock's Settings menu, VersaTimer transforms itself from a simple timer into an advanced reminder system. Users can … Read more

LG has finally released a second module for the LG Versa, in the form of a game pad module made for, well, playing games.

As you might recall, the Versa is a unique touch-screen phone with the option of attaching external modules. Previously, the Versa only came with a QWERTY keyboard module, which is handy for messaging and surfing the Web. Now it has this game pad controller, which you can slide on the back of the phone's body for storage when not in use.

Like you would expect, the game pad controller has an eight-way directional pad and … Read more

Bringing new meaning to the phrase "more than meets the eye," LG has partnered with Dreamworks to bring you a limited edition of the LG Versa with a Transformers theme to help promote the sequel to the 2007 summer blockbuster. In fact, Michael Bay himself will be on the scene at the LG booth in CTIA at 2 p.m. PDT Thursday to promote the phone and the movie, titled "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen."

It's fitting that they chose to make the LG Versa their promotional phone, as the touch-screen handset is quite transformative … Read more

On this week's episode of Dialed In, we discuss the latest Palm Pre news and how Sprint and Palm nearly gave us a heart attack this morning. Plus, Nicole takes a look at the wacky LG Versa and we answer a reader's question about why everyone complains about Windows Mobile and, well, apparently we have some strong feelings on the subject.

Rumor of the week Rumor about the LG Rumor 2

News HTC Magic, CDMA BlackBerry Pearl Flip pass through FCC New Nokia 5800 hits sour note T-Mobile expands $50 unlimited voice plan … Read more

We've been using the LG Versa for the past few days, and we wanted to love it, we really did. The LG Versa holds so much promise --it's the first touch-screen phone we know of that has the option of adding external modules.

In fact, it comes with a detachable QWERTY keyboard module included in the box. The idea really appealed to us; we could attach the keyboard when texting is a priority, and detach it when we wanted to lighten the load. It was like combining the best of the LG Dare and the LG Voyager in one convenient package.

All that, and the LG Versa has three customizable home screens, a full HTML browser with Flash Lite so we could watch YouTube on the fly, EV-DO, GPS, and stereo Bluetooth. So what's not to love?

The one sticking point turned out to be the browser. For some reason, the touch-screen response within the browser was incredibly stubborn. I ended up tapping at a button an average of 8 to 10 times before it would respond. When tapping the menu button, for example, the phone would vibrate, and there would be a clicking sound, but still the menu wouldn't pop up--at least not until several attempts later. … Read more