BMW has substantially cut the price of its Sirius Satellite Radio factory option from $595 to $350 on select 2010 vehicles (excludes 5 Series, 6 Series and X3) while also adding functionality. Customers who choose Sirius will continue to receive "The Sirius Everything" package for one year, along with some of the most popular XM channels available including Oprah Radio, XM Public Radio and several sports channels.

Beyond cheaper hardware and expanded channels, BMW and Sirius have also made the satellite radio more user friendly. Users can now view the channel list as a channel name, artist and a new "Instant Replay" function allows you to replay a favorite song or program. You can also choose favorite songs and receive an alert when one of your favorites is being played, which is one of those good ideas somebody should have thought of long ago.

Source: AutoBlog

When two Visalia, Calif., police officers swung their cruisers behind a sport utility vehicle that had been carjacked at gunpoint early Sunday, they prepared for a dangerous high-speed chase.
The 2009 Chevrolet Tahoe roared away with officers in pursuit, but shortly after the suspect made a right turn, operators at General Motors Co.'s OnStar service sent a command that electronically disabled the gas pedal and the SUV gradually came to a halt.

The flustered thief got out and ran, but was quickly nabbed after he climbed several fences and fell into a backyard swimming pool, police said. It was the first time since OnStar began offering the service in the 2009 model year that it was used to end a chase that could otherwise have had dire consequences.
"He wouldn't have pulled over if OnStar hadn't have shut the vehicle down," said Visalia Police Sgt. Steve Phillips. "Generally pursuits end in a collision."

The whole thing began when Jose Ruiz, 33, of nearby Lindsay, Calif., was sitting in his Tahoe in a lighted parking lot about 3 a.m. Sunday while his cousin was talking on a cell phone in the passenger seat. Out of the corner of his eye, Ruiz saw a man walking toward him. "He already had a gun out," Ruiz said Monday. The man pointed a sawed-off shotgun at Ruiz and ordered both men to get out of the Tahoe and empty their pockets. Ruiz's cousin at first refused, but Ruiz told him to obey, knowing that OnStar could find the stolen truck with a global positioning system. "I was afraid he was going to shoot my cousin. My cousin was arguing with him," Ruiz recalled.

The cousin relented and the man sped off in the truck. Ruiz then sprinted for a nearby pay telephone to call police, but ran into a sheriff's deputy on her break who notified Visalia police.
Officers quickly contacted OnStar and got Ruiz's permission to find the vehicle. Police spotted it a few miles away, but as officers made a U-turn to pursue it, the Tahoe sped off at a high speed, Phillips said.

The suspect made a turn, and police dispatchers told the pursuing officers that OnStar was about to disable the Tahoe. It then rolled to a halt, and the robber was quickly captured.
The 21-year-old suspect was jailed and faces preliminary charges of robbery, carjacking, possession of stolen property and resisting arrest.

Source: AOL

Driver is an iPhone application to remote control a car. Go to http://www.spiritofberlin.eu for more information on "Spirit of Berlin", a completely autonomous vehicle by the Freie Universität Berlin. It is equipped with various sensors and a drive-by-wire system for unmanned driving. iDriver is an addon to remote control the car with an iPhone.

Viper, a company producing and selling car alarms and remote starters, has launched Viper SmartStart for iPhone and iPod touch. The app works with Viper remote-start systems and can start a car, lock or unlock its doors, open its trunk, or even locate it in a parking lot. Users can also set off a panic alarm. While more than one car can be controlled with the app, multiple users can just as well control the same vehicle.

“Are you tired of carrying around another clunky remote control on your keychain, or finding yourself out of range when you really need to warm up or cool down your car before getting in?” Viper says. “Now you can remote start or lock and unlock your car just by pushing a button on your iPhone or iPod touch, using the exciting new Viper SmartStart app from Directed Electronics, the leader in vehicle security and remote start,” the official App Store description reads. More in the jump!

Viper cites the simple graphical interface as being the key feature giving users control over capabilities like lock/arm, unlock/disarm, remote car starter, trunk release and panic or car finder. The company also offers instructions for those looking to use the solution.

1) Download the free Viper SmartStart application to your iPhone or iPod touch;
2) Get SmartStart installed in your car (see www.viper.com/SmartStart for more information on SmartStart modules, and where to buy Viper SmartStart);
3) Set up your SmartStart account.

However, the Viper SmartStart solution requires a great deal of add-ons, so to speak, on the user’s end. While the three steps sound fairly easy, it's a bit more complicated.

First, you’ll need an iPhone or iPod touch. Then, if you’re an iPod touch user, the device will require a Wi-Fi connectivity. The actual Viper SmartStart application is also required, of course. You can easily download the app to your device via iTunes – luckily, it’s free. You also need a compatible Viper system in your car (see www.viper.com/SmartStart for details). Finally, a SmartStart service plan is required. SmartStart comes with a one-year service plan included, and renewals are $29 a year, while the terms and conditions apply.



Source: Softpedia

It's more serious than you think. Here's a very plausible accident scenario all caused by someone carelessly focusing their attention on their text message conversation instead of the road ahead. This video is VERY graphic.



Please comment and let me know what you thought of the video.

The first study of drivers texting inside their vehicles shows that the risk sharply exceeds previous estimates based on laboratory research — and far surpasses the dangers of other driving distractions.

The new study, which entailed outfitting the cabs of long-haul trucks with video cameras over 18 months, found that when the drivers texted, their collision risk was 23 times greater than when not texting.

The Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, which compiled the research and plans to release its findings on Tuesday, also measured the time drivers took their eyes from the road to send or receive texts.

In the moments before a crash or near crash, drivers typically spent nearly five seconds looking at their devices — enough time at typical highway speeds to cover more than the length of a football field.

Even though trucks take longer to stop and are less maneuverable than cars, the findings generally applied to all drivers, who tend to exhibit the same behaviors as the more than 100 truckers studied, the researchers said. Truckers, they said, do not appear to text more or less than typical car drivers, but they said the study did not compare use patterns that way. Full read at the source.

Source: NY Times

There are a number of Forza 3 cars that are quite "exclusive", in that they require you to either preorder the game, buy the Collector's Edition or become a VIP member of the game's community. These are those cars.

Microsoft sent word today that Forza 3 will not be delayed into 2010. Instead, the exact release date for the game in North America is October 27. No idea yet for Europe, but for Aussies and Kiwis, good news! It'll be out a little earlier, on October 23.

Along with the announcement, Microsoft has released a picture of the the finished box art for the game's special edition.

Source: Kotaku

Nissan has developed a prototype iPhone application that would allow electric car owners to dial into their vehicles and check battery levels. The application, a working version of which was demonstrated by the company at its research facility in Yokosuka, Japan, links to the car's IT system to check the status of the Lithium Ion batteries that power the car.

Using it, owners will be able to monitor charging of their cars while away from the vehicles. The system could come in handy, for example, when cars are parked at public charging stations and owners want to fully charge the batteries before driving away.

In addition to the basic monitoring of battery level, more detailed information can be sent to the phone that includes the time required for a full charge and the approximate cost. The information also includes the current temperature inside the car and that ties into a second function of the application: remote control of the car's air conditioning system. That might sound like a random and perhaps strange function but it's all in the name of energy efficiency.

The system is still a prototype and part of Nissan's research towards the 2010 debut of a production electric car in Japan and North America. The car will be unveiled on Sunday.

Source: PC World

While both can result in death, drunk driving may be safer only because your eyes are glued to the road. Recently Car & Driver did some testing and found out that texting is very, very unsafe. Duh! Full read in the jump!

A road test run by Car & Driver magazine showed dramatically slower reaction times by two test drivers who tried to brake while reading and, separately, writing text messages. Previous studies on DWT have typically been run in car simulators. The magazine believes its study may be the first conducted in a real vehicle on a stretch of road.

To cover different age ranges, two separate tests were set up on a road course--one with 22-year-old Jordan Brown, a Car & Driver intern, the other with the magazine's 37-year-old editor-in-chief, Eddie Alterman.

Using a Honda Pilot as the test vehicle, both drivers first drove a straight line and were told to hit the brake in response to a light that flashed on the dashboard. That measured their baseline reaction time. The second test had the drivers read a text message while driving; the third asked them to type a message while behind the wheel.

An additional test also compared the effects of DWT with driving while intoxicated, on the same day under the same road conditions. After downing enough alcohol to become legally drunk, the test subjects took to the road again.

The results showed that at 35 mph, it took a sober Brown an extra 21 feet to hit the brake while reading a text message, and an extra 16 feet while typing a message.

At 70 mph, it took him 30 extra feet to jam on the brake while reading a text, and an extra 31 feet while composing.

Those figures compared with an extra 7 feet at 35 mph and an extra 15 feet at 70 mph while intoxicated. However, in his drunken condition, Brown had to be told twice which lane to drive in--a dangerous scenario if he had been in actual traffic.

At 35 mph, a sober Alterman took an extra 188 feet to step on the brake while reading a text, and an extra 90 feet while typing a message.

At 70 mph, he took an extra 129 feet to hit the brake while reading a message, and an additional 319 feet while writing one.

While intoxicated, it took him at extra 7 feet at 35 mph and an extra 15 feet at 70 mph.

"In our test, neither of us had any idea texting would slow down our reaction time so much," said Alterman. "Like most folks, we believe we are good drivers, but the real key to driving safely is keeping your eyes and your mind on the road. Text messaging distracts any driver from those primary tasks."

Car & Driver also noted the relatively safe conditions of its test, compared with driving in the real world. The two subjects drove down a straight line without other cars, signals, or pedestrians.

Source: Car and Driver via CNET

Peter-Frans Pauwels, TomTom's co-founder and CTO, demonstrated TomTom's navigation software in combination with a specially designed car kit on the iPhone- during Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco on June 8th, 2009.

The TomTom solution combines two new TomTom products to provide users with state of the art in-car navigation on their iPhone 3G:

* The TomTom navigation application for iPhone; an Apple version of TomTom's award-winning turn-by-turn navigation software, including IQ Routes and latest maps from Tele Atlas;
* The TomTom car kit for iPhone; a specially developed car kit for secure docking, enhanced GPS performance, clear voice instructions, hands-free calling and in-car charging.

The TomTom navigation application for iPhone will be available via the Apple iTunes App Store, following the release of Apple's OS 3.0 operating system. Details regarding pricing and availability for both the application and the TomTom car kit for iPhone will be made available in advance of the products' launch later this summer. Video in the jump!



Source: engadget

Apple recently previewed its iPhone OS 3.0, and among the many features of the software update will be the ability to get turn-by-turn GPS directions.

Application developers will be able to utilize the iPhone's Core Location feature to make a navigation program with turn-by-turn directions. Although the new applications are not allowed to use the standard Google mapping system as a base, they can make use of the phone's internal GPS and cellular tower triangulation to determine location.

Third-party navigation manufacturers like TomTom, Garmin, Mio and Magellan should all have apps in the works, considering they already have unique touch-mapping systems designed for their units.

Other updates for 3.0 include MMS, the ability to view mail in landscape, copy and paste, new parental control options and automatic log-in at WiFi hot spots. Apple expects it to be available this summer.

Source: Inside Line

Being the tech-savvy company it is (or at least it wants to show that it is), BMW has released a new game for the iPhone and iPod Touch to show off its new Z4 Roadster. The game that can be downloaded for free from Apple is inspired from the BMW Z4´s "An Expression of Joy" campaign and it allows players to "draw" using the wheels of their car by choosing different colors of paint so that their tire tracks create drawings.

Furthermore, the application offers players the chance to explore, customize, create and virtually drive the hardtop Z4 Roadster.

Source: CarScoop