>> Nissan's Maxima, it's one of that company's oldest nameplates. But it's grown up rather nicely in a tech sense. Let's check the tech on a 2007 Nissan Maxima 3.5 SE.
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So inside this car we've got a lot of gear because our particular Maxima has been loaded up pretty well. So bear that in mind. First of all, we notice the navigation screen, a fairly common Nissan piece. Like it and don't like it at the same time. What I do like about it is their bird's eye view is very good. The response of the system I find to be also very good. You're not allowed to enter destination while you're on the fly. Carmakers make different decisions on that. They decide no, they're going to tell you what to do. So I'm not crazy about that. On the other hand, you've also got voice guidance ability. You can use your voice or you can use this annoying little fiddly thing. I don't know even what to call this. This little knob is, is kind of like a laptop joystick, but it's much more sensitive. Every time I've run into this, I've hated it and Nissan loves it. Just give it the slightest little touch and you tip over to one direction or the other, very devilishly hard to use while under way. Let's drop down from the navigation system and check out the audio. The basic system is AM FM and a single CD only slot. No MP3 or WMA ability, but it does include at the base level, this auxiliary jack down here, kind of hidden behind the shifter. When you bump up for 1050, you go to a Bose branded system, although I can't find a Bose logo anywhere in this car, which gives you a little better sound. Still the same eight speakers, but they're better speakers. You also get a six disk in dash changer that handles MP3 as the label says and WMA disks which the label nowhere on here does say for some strange reason. Now the upgraded system can also bring in sat radio in either flavor, Sirius or XM, you chose at the point of buying and ordering the car. The sat radio button right here obviously is an indication of that. And right next to that is the auxiliary button, which of course tells the system to follow whatever is plugged in there. Let's talk transmission for a minute. This car has one transmission only. The CVT, a continuously variable transmission. And the idea is to keep this car in the sweet spot all of the time. And it usually runs around 2000 to 3000 RPM in typical driving. However, what's odd about this Xtronic transmission is its shiftable, which is odd for a car that doesn't have gears. What are you shifting? What you're doing is you're influencing artificial RPM shift points to create the synthetic feeling of a geared transmission if you want to drive it that way. So you go over here into the gate, you can move up and down, you even have gear numbers on the display, which is really nuts because the car doesn't have any gears. But it does provide a satisfying experience in either way. It's a real ready to get up and go car. Part of that of course is a good powerful engine, but the bigger part of it I think is that the car feels like its on cam all the time because CVTs are really good at that. So what's putting power through that CVT? A familiar Nissan mill, 3 and a half-liter, dual overhead cam, aluminum V6, 24 valve. Outputs about 250 horse and 250 foot pounds. Let's price this guy out. First option I see is the power glass sunroof, that's almost 900 dollars. The next big item we have is called the driver-preferred package, 3750, you get a lot for that. The fancy seats, the heating of the seats, a bunch of other comfort features, but tech wise, that brings us Bluetooth hands free, high intensity Visine On headlights. We also get the upgraded audio system that I mentioned with the six-disk changer and the better speakers and amplification. The navigation package is 1800. All in, this car goes from 28000 base to 36000 loaded.
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