Car Tech

Volvo has selected electronics giant Mitsubishi Electric, a subsidiary of the same group that owns the automaker Mitsubishi, to help develop next-generation infotainment systems for use in its future cars. Mitsubishi Electric will develop the central module and be the main supplier for the overall...

When it comes to hands-free infotainment solutions, automakers aren’t the only ones looking to make both the government and consumers happy. Now Apple has joined the fray, with a novel approach to adding steering-wheel-mounted controls. As the diagram shows, Apple’s solution is a...

Once the preserve of control panels on the Starship Enterprise, touch technology is now central to some of the most popular gadgets, including smartphones and satellite-navigation systems. It'll soon take over much of our car interiors too, says electronics firm Magna. The company has been working...

Ford's engineers went to great lengths to make sure the new Focus ST sounds as fast as it goes.

Lightweight cars aren't just good for better gas mileage: they're also faster. Audi's race technology has been well-known to flow toward its production cars, but the level of devotion to lightweight construction shown with the latest R18 e-tron quattro Le Mans racer isn't likely to make the...

Volkswagen--the People's Car--is aiming to become the car of the People's Republic of China. This look at the future of VW car tech comes courtesy of the People's Car Project at Auto China 2012. The ideas themselves come from 119,000 ideas submitted from the 33 million visits to the project's site...

After first announcing its self-driving, autonomous car project in 2010, Google is now about to embark on the next major advancement of the technology and that is to team up with a major automaker. The technology giant has already tested its fleet of autonomous cars over hundreds of thousands of...

When it comes to innovations in safety and driver aids, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Volvo, and a few other brands have long led the way, particularly in the realm of the use of technology to those ends. But the latest and greatest innovations in the field are often limited to a handful of the upper-tier...

The only certainty of electric car technology is that nobody is really certain of our future path. Dozens of different battery technologies are under development all around the world to fix the common battery limitations--limited energy density, heavy weight, long recharging times--and one such...

During any given auto race, what transpires on the track is just one of several contests taking place--especially in Formula 1. There are pit crews, of course, but behind the scenes are teams of technicians in high gear at keyboards and screens. Their real-time monitoring and adjustments come from...

If you're a gamer and into racing titles, you'll know the rivalry between Forza Motorsport 4 on the Xbox 360 and Gran Turismo 5 on the PS3 is as intense as that between Ford and GM. Gran Turismo has always had the realism and car diversity, Forza the greater fun factor and better online play. With...

Anyone who’s driven on a busy highway can attest that vehicles moving erratically and braking needlessly breaks up the smooth flow of traffic and leads to congestion. Honda has also observed this phenomenon and claims to have pioneered a technology based on this principle that, rather than...

Self-driving cars, for better or for worse, are most likely inevitable. We wouldn’t expect them to appear in the next few years, or even the next decade, but much beyond that some degree of autonomous driving is all but guaranteed. Between now and then is the gray area, where the building...

America used to be the land of innovation, where progress was limited only by the imagination of engineers. Then corporate attorneys got involved, and most innovation was stamped out by the fear of product liability lawsuits. Technical challenges aside, there’s a reason we’re not all...

We may soon be able to drive cars that will know if we’ve had a rough day or whether we’re about to fall asleep behind the wheel. That’s the premise of new mood-sensing technology Toyota is working on in an effort to build safer cars. We first brought you details on the technology...

They're in your home, in your phone and they've been in your car for several years now--we're talking about computers. High-tech on-board infotainment systems are certainly useful, but not always easy to fathom. That's why Lexus is letting customers try before they buy--by releasing the Enform...

The 2013 Porsche Cayenne GTS has been officially revealed ahead of its debut at the Beijing Auto Show later this month. If you're looking for a lean, mean, sporting SUV, this may be the ticket. Nissan's rumored sub-370Z 240SX revival may be back on the table, especially now that the Subaru...

Real revolutions in engine technology are rare. By and large, the internal combustion engine has remained much the same for well over a century, with just general, incremental improvements in all areas separating today's engines from those in the very first automobiles. Scuderi's patented...

Though Powermat had plans last year to deliver in-car wireless charging to GM, first through the Volt, and later other brands, the cars didn't materialize. Until now. The 2013 Dodge Dart is now the first car in the industry to offer built-in in-vehicle wireless charging. It's available as a $199.99...

For many, electric cars seem rather simple: just stick a battery and an electric motor in place of the regular oily bits. While it's far more complex than that, there are other concerns beyond the powertrain itself. Things like sound--or a lack of it--both for occupants and bystanders. To deal with...