Carsales Staff•26 Jul 2013
NEWS
Infiniti Q50 offers personalisation for four
Billions of setting combinations available in prestige brand's new sedanA programmable key offering almost 100 settings across 10 different functions will provide owners billions of personalisation options for the Infiniti Q50, the prestige manufacturer claims.
The i-Key will take out all the hassle of climbing into your Q50, only to find that the seat's too close to the wheel, the external mirrors are pointing at the ground and the audio volume has been 'Spinal Tapped' to 11.
According to Infiniti, the system will 'remember' whether you like your keypad to be arranged in alphabetical order or based on a QWERTY sequence. It will welcome you by your name and can display up to 16 of your personal photos as wallpapers for the dual touch screens.
Infiniti calls the technology behind i-Key 'My car knows me', and the four users (three registered and one guest) are shared between the two keys provided with each new Q50 delivered. Full Aussie specs are yet to be decided, but one system that can be personalised through the i-Key will be the Infiniti Drive Mode Selector's 'Personal' mode, which allows individual memorised settings for different throttle calibration, transmission shift points and steering weight/response.
Other settings for Australian-delivered vehicles may include driving safety aids, which could be turned off altogether, or partly disabled by degree. Infiniti's safety technology bundle is named Safety Shield and embraces Predictive Forward Collision Warning, which not only assesses the threat posed by the car in front – based on speed and distance to impact – but the car in front of that.
As is often the case with cars offering advanced primary safety systems, it's by no means certain that the Q50 will arrive in Australia with the full gamut of technology available in other markets. The systems we may (or may not) see here are: Back-up Collision Intervention, Intelligent Brake Assist Plus, Lateral Stability Enhancement, Active Trace Control, Intelligent Cruise Control, Distance Control Assist, Active Lane Control, High Beam Assistant and Blind Spot Intervention and Warning. All of these features can be tailored to suit the individual driver.
Of course, comfort and convenience features are not forgotten, and the i-Key will immediately set the driving position, climate control, satellite navigation and infotainment systems to meet the requirements of each driver. Even units of measurement and the clock face can be selected and stored in the i-Key memory.
The Q50, which is likely to reach Australia in the form of a 2.2-litre diesel variant and/or a 3.5-litre petrol/electric hybrid, is scheduled for launch here later in the year. In the UK it has been announced at a starting price of £27,950 for the diesel, or £40,000 for the hybrid. The Q50 in Britain will be sold in four levels of trim, three of them diesel (SE, Premium and Sport). As the flagship, the Q50 Hybrid will be sold with all the whizz-bang features of the lower-grade models, and sports suspension/brakes and a sound to warn pedestrians of the car's approach.
The entry-level price for the Q50 is about £5000 more than a UK-spec BMW 316d with 2.0-litre turbo-diesel with delivery miles on the odometer, or about £6000 more than a new Mercedes-Benz C 200 CDI BlueEFFICIENCY Executive SE – both cars advertised online. For the money, the Q50 SE in Britain will feature as standard auto-stop/start, reversing camera, Bluetooth, six airbags, cruise control/speed limiter, heated exterior mirrors, rain-sensing wipers, dual-zone climate control, leather-bound multi-function steering wheel, keyless entry/start, tyre-pressure monitoring and 17-inch alloy wheels with run-flat tyres.
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Written byCarsales Staff
Our team of independent expert car reviewers and journalists
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