Lincoln's smallest sedan, the MKZ, works hard to distinguish itself from platform-mates the Ford Fusion and Mercury Milan. But it's going to need a little more luxury to stand out.
Wayne Cunningham
Wayne Cunningham reviews cars and writes about automotive technology for CNET's Roadshow. Prior to the automotive beat, he covered spyware, Web building technologies, and computer hardware. He began covering technology and the Web in 1994 as an editor of The Net magazine.
The Lincoln MKZ is the smallest car under that brand name, and shares its platform with the Ford Fusion and Mercury Milan.
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Lincoln's design language, initially set forth on the MKS model, uses this big, winged grille, along with large Lincoln badges.
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The 3.5-liter V-6 under the hood is behind the tech curve, producing only average fuel economy and 263 horsepower.
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As a midsize sedan, the MKZ seats four comfortably, but can handle five in a pinch. Head and leg room are both good.
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This model is an all-wheel-drive version. The platform is designed for front-wheel-drive, another option with the MKZ.
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Lincoln trims the cabin nicely, although the plastic buttons on the stack mar the luxury effect.
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One of the most useful buttons on the steering wheel activates voice command, which lets you tell the car to dial contacts by name or play music by artist or album.
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The font on the instrument cluster gauges is stylish, and should have been used elsewhere in the cabin.
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The transmission is a six-speed automatic, with its tallest gear helping out freeway fuel economy. It includes a manual gear selection mode, but it is designed for engine braking.
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The hard-drive-based navigation system responds quickly, and includes this useful traffic overlay.
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Sirius TravelLink, included with navigation, brings in traffic, weather, gas prices, and movie schedules.
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The Jukebox is an area of hard-drive space reserved for music. Albums ripped to the hard drive will sometimes also get album art, as can be seen with this Sting album.
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The THX audio system uses 14 speakers and a 600 watt amp to produce very good quality sound.
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The Bluetooth phone system is based on Sync, and lets you see all your phone contacts on the LCD.
