While the 2010 Honda Insight EX with navigation may not be as hyper-miler friendly as the Prius, it represents a much better value and is more fun to drive.
Up front, the Insight's nose is almost an exact replica of the front end of the Honda FCX Clarity hydrogen fuel-cell vehicle. Squint your eyes and you'll see a bit of a smiling Transformer face.
While Honda claims the body lines of the new Insight are an homage to the old model, it's fairly obvious that they were at least inspired by the silhouette of the Toyota Prius. Fortunately, the Insight's more-aggressive nose makes it, in our opinion, a more attractive vehicle than the Toyota hybrid.
Look out of the Insight's rear-view mirror and you'll see a split-glass view featuring a cross-member that horizontally bisects the field of view.
While this same configuration is prominent on the Prius, the first-gen Insight and, looking further back, the Honda CRX also featured split rear glass, so we can't 100-percent credit Toyota.
The Insight features the same 1.3-liter IMA engine as the Civic hybrid, but has been tuned to output 98 combined gas and electric ponies (vs. the Civic's 110). Torque is rated at 123 combined pound-feet and, thanks to instant-on electric power, is all available as low as 1,000rpm.
The Insight's steering wheel is a Honda parts bin trispoke design that we've seen on the Fit, Civic, and CR-V. At the EX trim level, the wheel gains illuminated controls for audio and cruise control.
A continuously variable transmission (CVT) connects the IMA engine to the wheels. Spec your Insight as an EX model and you gain a Sport mode with steering wheel-mounted paddle shifters. Who'd have thought a hybrid could be this fun to drive?
To the left of the steering wheel is this green ECON button. Pressing it puts the Insight into Eco Assist mode, which Honda claims further boosts efficiency by modifying various systems.
In practice, we noticed no differences between Eco Assist and standard Drive, but perhaps this is due to our vehicle's preproduction status.
The lower tier of the instrument cluster features (from left to right) the charge and assist meter, which monitors the flow of power from the batteries, the large center tachometer, the multi-information display in the center of the tachometer, which displays fuel-economy information among other parameters, and the ever-important fuel gauge.
Fully illuminated, the Insight's instrument cluster looks fantastically sci-fi. At the top of the dash sits the speedometer. The speedo's backlighting, while normally blue, changes to a bright green to notify you when you're driving economically.
Honda's satellite-linked navigation is the same touch-screen GPS available throughout Honda's entire lineup. While the system features one of the best voice-command systems in this market segment, it's beginning to show its age.
The Insight's map doesn't feature traffic, but otherwise features an easy learning curve. Directions are easy to understand, though the inclusion of text-to-speech would greatly increase its usability. You can talk to the system; why can't it talk back?
Destinations can be entered by hand or by speaking or spelling the names of streets or businesses aloud. If you're ever stumped about what you can or can't say, there's an extensive help system.
Spec the navigation system and Honda will toss in Bluetooth hands-free calling and a center console mounted USB port. Bring your own sync cable and the audio system will read from your iPod.
Honda has, for what we can only assume are ergonomic reasons, clustered the HVAC controls into this pod. While closer to the driver and easier to reach, this configuration is both difficult to understand at a glance and creates the new ergonomic problem of moving the touch screen further away from the driver.
Even with a few lead-footed excursions into the Insight EX's Sport mode, we had the darnedest time emptying its tank for an accurate fuel economy reading. Averaging 43.2 mpg over the course of the week, sights like this one will be few and far in between.
