4/12/11

Land Rover Range Rover 2007

Cars Mania Blog

Auto Car | Land Rover Range Rover 2007 | Years of schlepping through waist-high mud, clambering down hills, fording rivers, and generally having a good old off-road time gave Land Rover an enviable reputation in the 4x4 world. Then came the age of the SUV, where comfort trumped off-road performance and the mall parking lot became the most arduous terrain that immaculately waxed 4x4s had to negotiate. Although Land Rover continued to stress the off-road prowess of its marque, the Range Rover dominated this world of luxury SUVs, becoming the ride of choice for movie premieres and executive parking lots.



When we took delivery of a freshly minted 2007 Land Rover Range Rover Supercharged this week, we decided to take it back to its family roots, back to basics, back--quite literally--to the clay in which its parents' reputations were fashioned. Sure, we had a couple of reservations before plunging this $100K Giverny Green aristomobile into the muck and rubble of an off-road course. From the inside, the leather-and-cherry-wood-trimmed 2007 Range Rover was about as sophisticated and as far from the trials of arcadia as you can get: touch screen, voice-activated GPS navigation; Bluetooth hands-free phone integration; a 14-speaker surround-sound audio system; rear-seat DVD system; and triple-zone air-conditioning being just a few of the technoluxuries on offer. And while the Supercharged Range Rover did have a potent 400-horsepower V-8, we figured that this was probably designed more for the left-hand lane of the freeway than for California's Carnegie state vehicular recreation area.



But then we took another look at Land Rover's claims: The 2007 Range Rover, they tell us, is the first of Land Rover's flagship models to include Terrain Response, a system designed to "boost off-road prowess" by adapting engine, transmission, suspension, and traction controls for different off-road conditions. We just had to see how it worked in practice. Including $2,500 for the rear-seat entertainment system and a $715 delivery charge, our 2007 Range Rover Supercharged tester weighed in at $95,350, making for a seriously high-end romp in the rough.
When we got the 2006 Range Rover Sport Supercharged for review a few months ago, we panned it for its interior look and feel. Black plastic met us wherever we turned in the cabin, the seats were too hard, and the dislocated nature of the phone, navigation, and stereo interfaces added to the disappointment. Thankfully, Range Rover raises the stakes considerably when it comes to its flagship model, and with the 2007 Range Rover Supercharged, the interior is more like what you'd expect from a car pushing a six-figure price tag.



As with all modern Range Rover interiors, the 2007 Supercharged cabin is reminiscent of a plane cockpit, with an enormous wood-trimmed central console supporting the shifter and two cup holders. Apart from the fact that the gear shifter has been moved slightly nearer to the driver, the only significant difference between the central column in the 2007 Range Rover and that of its 2006 predecessor is the inclusion of the Terrain Response dial. As we saw in our reviews of the 2006 Land Rover LR3 and 2006 Range Rover Sport, Terrain Response's rotary control enables the driver to optimize vehicle settings for different kinds of driving surfaces: see the Performance section for details on how we put the system thoroughly through its paces.



Other cabin tech in the Range Rover Supercharged includes standard Bluetooth hands-free calling with voice activation, an as-standard 14-speaker surround-sound audio system, standard voice-activated navigation, and an optional rear-seat DVD entertainment system. Pairing our Samsung SGH-ZX20 to the Bluetooth interface was an intuitive procedure, with all configuration done using the phone buttons. Once a phone is connected to the system, calls can be made using the Range Rover's in-dash touch-screen keypad or using the voice-recognition system, which managed to understand phone numbers and dial commands after multiple attempts. Call quality is a little muffled, as with any speaker phone system, but we had no trouble understanding our phonee or--apparently--being understood ourselves.

Source : reviews.cnet.com

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