regfootball

Along with the polls above, lets speculate on 'who gets Toyota's lost market share? .... and, how much (what percent) of market share do they lose? For example, if their share of the market currently is 16% and you think their share will go down to 14%, then they will lose 2% of market share. For percent, assume the period of time is all of calendar year 2010.

too pooped to follow up on this tonight. but the mpg did not come in quite as good as i hoped. don't have the numbers in front of me, but it was around 27 mpg i think. i know the car is not broken in but i think it probably would have been nice to hit the 30 mark. my dad's dts will hit 27 on road trips. with 100 more horsepower. although, the altima and its four popper are probably just as fast as the DTS is......

The CVT is the best of the breed, and is very tight. Most folks might not even notice that it's there. It's better than the Subaru one by far. Return leg is today, so I will beat on it some more and see how it shakes out. Passing power with the cvt4 is very good although it doesn't have the deep reserves of a 6. This cvt almost 'kicks down' faster than most 6 speeds. It does have pushbutton start. At first I hated it. But you can leave the car running, take your keys with, lock the car , and just let it warm up by itself. I wish it had remote start too, but then you just jump in and go and no key to put back in the ignition.

Mpg is improving as the car is breaking in. The 'mpg meter' was a lot friendlier today.

Yes the interface. Vista was horrible. So bad I have no plans for win 7. Apple manages to simplify the mess. In terms of working easy , the way you expect , delighting in simple ways and has nicer more polished designs and materials. I'll take a nice aluminum case that will look good forever with a dura le gorgeous glass screen. No ugly cd rom drive. Fewer cables. More functional software included ( for example you can make music and movies my win laptop the DVD player and cdr software or office wasn't even included. It's not. 'being a fan boi' it's simply having devices that are nicer to use and you want to own becuase they don't look like afterthought toy factory in china plastic crap. So if I have to pay some more, that's fine. It's better to be happy with a large purchase than to spend less but hate what you spent it on. That is more wasteful. To be honest I do not subscribe to the whole 'culture of apple' the geeks at the genius bar etc. But I just simply like their products.

funny, I was watching YouTube on my iPhone just a bit ago, without flash.......YouTube won't be an issue.

the interior is not that bad. The design feels dated. For the price I think the materials are ok. Comparing base model to base model the interior is nicer thanthe Accord, but I prefer the Malibu, Fusion, and Legacy interiors to the Altima. Some of the ergonomics feel dated too. But it's not disagreeable. One thing, the four cyl / CVT is ballsy! And there is not much slop in the CVT! They really are improving these things! More balls than my FIL's Grand Prix. Much better car to drive than the GP! No need for the 6 cyl in this car for 90% of the people. Turning circle is huge! Chassis is not exactly bank vault solid. Seat sucks. Radio sounds like $h!.

Well, I had to trip it this weekend, 1000 miles and didn't want to take the Aztek. That, and the Aztek and Taurus X would net about 20 mpg on the trip. So I did the math and decided to rent a car. I made the reservation for a full size and Hertz, thinking I would get what I wanted, a Chevy Malibu. Of course, you can only bet, not choose, and I got STUCK with a new (200 miles on the odo) Nissan Altima S. 4 cyl, white. Gonna go retrieve it soon and do part of the trip this evening. I am not that upset about the Altima, since my main motive was to save gas. I understand the Altima with CVT gets really good highway mpg and in that regard it should be bang on for the trip. I don't really like the Altima, or CVT's so this should be interesting. The car does have an AUX input so I think I am in good shape. Most of the miles will be interstate, so I won't be canyon carving, but its a great op. for me to evaluate the car as an everyday and long trip family vehicle. Not that I would buy one but I do have a friend who is thinking about an Altima so this should be a great way to advise him. Any questions I will try to respond as I drive the next couple days (while I am stopped of course). But then I will write up most of my thoughts at the end. I am about to look at Nissan's website to see what comes standard with the car. And in the meantime I really wish it were a Malibu, but this is not a bad substitute.

and the notebook you describe is a huge brick in comparison. portability of the iPad is more like the kindle or a portable dvd player. windows products are highly disposable. no one remembers the cheap laptop they bought 3 years ago, its either obsolete by now, or broken. this device is something that will remain useful longer. the mactax IMHO only applies to the highest price macbook pros and most optioned up IMacs. if the device is nicer and works better and has more software its not that much of an effective price difference. not all products are sold only on price like GM used to be accused of.

i kind of don't care about the open source thing. the apps and products and buying experience all work so well and simple, and gives me what i need. open source to me means more clutter, more confusion, in some instances. i really don't need 20 versions of itunes when the one i have already works exactly the way i want, and will always be top of the class.

i wonder if they will make a larger one, a max-i pad

already have the iphone and appletv. will one day have imac, macbook and one of these things. the apple products are so nice to use. and i dont sit at the computer to game, so i really don't care about that. itunes is so easy to buy music and movies and videos from. and i don't steal that stuff off the internet. i don't mind electronic purchasing to itunes and the whole program organizes it simply and slickly and shares between devices in simple effective ways. they play nice with each other too. my iphone can control my itunes on the computer, or the appletv hooked up to my stereo. no extra stuff to get it work. all on wifi. you can rent a movie on itunes and play it on the ipad. no disc. you could even watch netflix streaming on the ipad. a terribly useful device, not a throwaway, nice size. its not for everyone, it doesn't need to be. apple covers what most folks do with computers at home with a few devices. the simplicity of it all is so worth the cost. buy an imac, you've got all the software you need.

how bout we call it good and i'll send you a new regal when it comes out.

this thing is awesome for watching movies, videos, surfing, and book reading. why get a Kindle? Perfect device for media on the go. If you want a keyboard, you can get that too. Starts at 500 bucks and way more useful at that price than say, a stupid netbook running xp and 1g of ram. i'd love to have one. perfect device for my kids to watch movies in the car while traveling. great for surfing while in the rest room. not every apple device has to be a full on computer. why blow 300 on a kindle when for 200 bucks more you can watch movies and check your email?

ugh, missed saying Happy Birthday to you! We all know Bob wasn't there for yogurt, he was buying tofu, or sprouts, or granola.

lol..

i looked at the H3 for awhile. it's unique and fun, has a nice interior. cargo is a little sparse, yes visibility is an issue. from what i have read, the biggest issue is fuel economy. and if that comes with less than desired acceleration, then it can hurt the overall love thing. but they did upgrade the motor, even added a turbo at some point? bonus is that you can even get one with a stick. its not a throwaway ride. you can buy one and know you have something with value you can own for many years. its durable and tough. looks good. i think resale on those things will be good over time. maybe not right now, but deals can be had. you won't lose much money. hope that was some useful insight (no pun intended) for you. honestly it would be kind of blah to get just a small truck or blazer if you could get this for similar money.

not a bad idea, and twenty years from now this will show GM as a leader in shifting some of the paradiggem from gas motors to electric. someday, cars will be driven by wheel motors at each corner of the car within the wheel, i think. maybe this sort of thing will be a faster path to that, too.

starbucks french roast for me. when out and about, either a depth charge moosed at caribou, or a venti starbucks with 2 shots of espresso added. no sugar or cream. reminds me of the girl in the movie airplane.....

the aztek is ugly, but its tight. very solidly built, nary a rattle after 110k miles.....

tdi performance in winter no tdi for me.....although i wish they would translate those numbers to amurchan.... coincidentally, i also just noticed (hadn't crossed my attention until yesterday). hyundai's elantra touring wagon, they dropped the base price to 15995 for 2010. that is one car i will take for a spin soon. base 16g, loaded19g. definitely less expensive than a jetta sportwagen. also a couple saturdays ago i took a mits lancer out for a test drive. just haven't wrote it up yet. it will be my first use of voice to text app on the iphone. should be interesting.

almost 260 torque though, should be a gutty motor.

IMHO the regals closest comparison car is the VW CC, and that starts about 28 grand i think. an automatic would be around 30k.

need to know, turbo manual CXL with sunroof, what is the price.

i could slice up some tasty tomatoes or some lunch meat on that grille