MT Pits 2012 Porsche 911 Carrera S Aganist 2012 Corvette Grand Sport

Chevrolet's Corvette and Porsche's 911 are two of the most recognized and longest living sports car nameplates in history. Both models have evolved in many ways over the years but also remain true to their heritage.

The 2012 Porsche 911 was only just introduced into the market this year sporting an entirely new platform and a lighter body, while the sixth generation of Corvette has been with us since 2005 and has entered its final year of production as Chevrolet will present an all new model next year.

Nonetheless, since we live in the "today", Motor Trend's editor-at-large Angus MacKenzie took the 436-horsepower 2012 Corvette Grand Sport and compared it with the 400-horsepower 2012 Porsche 911 Carrera S.

Read more »

Road & Track Pits the 2013 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 against the 2013 Nissan GT-R

They may be different as night and day in most aspects, but we shouldn't forget that both the 2013 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 and the latest 2013 Nissan GT-R are aimed at the sports car enthusiast.

Nevertheless, we do find the pairing from Road & Track for its latest test a tad odd for one specific reason: pricing.

You see, Camaro ZL1 with its 580HP 6.2L supercharged V8 will retail for $54,995 (€41,800) when it arrives in dealerships this spring, whereas the 2013 edition of the 545HP Nissan GT-R starts from $96,820 (€73,500) not including destination and handling fees. This means there's more $40,000 difference between the two cars.

Read more »

First Drive: Holden Caprice V Series II with 6.0-liter V8

The car that most Americans know as the Chevy Caprice PPV (Police Patrol Vehicle) owes as much to the Australian designed and built Holden Caprice luxury sedan reviewed here as the latter owes to business decisions Ford Australia made a couple of decades ago.

In the early 1970s, Holden – GM’s Australian subsidiary – introduced two new models to compete with local rival Ford. The first was the Statesman, a vehicle with no Holden badging whatsoever, designed as a direct competitor to Ford’s Australian-built Fairlane and as a replacement for the unloved Brougham sedan.

A few years later came the Statesman Caprice, an even more luxurious model, introduced to compete with Ford’s freshly minted LTD.

Thus the Caprice name was born. Over the years the Caprice has grown in interior room, price and standard equipment but retains the same basic idea of what Aussie luxury should be. We took the V8 engined V Series II model out for a week long road test and review.

Read more »

Sights and Sounds of the New Toyota 86 from First JDM Test Drive [Video]

Our coverage on the production version of what we came to know as the FT-86 in concept form but which Toyota decided to name GT 86 for the European region and simply '86' in its home market of Japan, continues with two fresh videos that depict the rear-wheel drive sports car in action.

The first clip is from a quick spin around the Fuji Speedway racetrack, while the second video includes a more comprehensive test drive from a Japanese car magazine that provides us with a more in-depth look at the sights and sounds of the 86 as well as in a wider palette of colors.

Toyota is highly optimistic about the '86', which it describes as an "entirely driver-focused sports car, designed to recapture the fundamental joys of motoring".

The Japanese firm's recipe includes a 200HP naturally-aspirated engine mounted up front matched to a six-speed manual (or 6sp automatic) and a limited slip differential driving the rear wheels, and a near-perfect 53:47 front-to-rear weight distribution.

Read more »

2012 Honda CR-V Video Roundup: First Test Drives and Commercial

Being that's only a matter of weeks before the new CR-V arrives in Honda's showrooms across the United States, it doesn't come to much of a surprise that the media has already had some time behind the wheel of the Japanese maker's crossover model.

Today, we found two first test drive videos of the 2012 Honda CR-V from Motor Trend magazine and Consumer Reports, both of which, more or less state the same: that the crossover model has been refined in an evolutionary manner building on the qualities of its predecessor.

You can watch both tests along with Honda's first web-commercial on the new CR-V right after the break.

Read more »

Video: Fifth Gear Drops the Top on the New Ferrari 458 Italia Spider

Some guys girls have all the luck - like Fifth Gear’s Vicki Butler-Henderson who recently had the opportunity to drive Ferrari’s brand-new 458 Italia Spider on the twisty roads around Maranello.

Now, we’ve watched one too many episodes of the British motoring TV show to know that Vicki can really drive – so no blonde jokes here, despite the fact that she does seem to have a great sense of humor.

Read more »

MT Slams 2012 Ford Explorer 2.0L EcoBoost, Says it's Slow, Clumsy, Pricey and Thirsty

Now here's a review that is bound to get the conversation heated up. Motor Trend's senior editor, Jonny Lieberman of former Jalopnik, The Truth About Cars and Autoblog fame, tried out the new 2012 Ford Explorer with the 2.0-liter EcoBoost turbocharged four that produces 240-ponies. And well, let's just say he didn't like it one bit.

After testing the Explorer, Lieberman states, among other things, that the 2.0-liter model is "slow, clumsy, pricey, thirstier than we would have thought, and a packaging disaster".

Read more »

First Drive: New Peugeot 508 GT 2.2-liter HDi Sedan

It’s been a long time since Peugeot had a serious contender in the hotly contested sub-premium segment. The 407 was unloved and lacking in style; a “307 with a boot” purchased exclusively by the brand faithful. It was a bit bland and outdated compared to its major European competitor: the Mk 4 Ford Mondeo.

With the 508, Peugeot hopes to change all that. A carbon copy of the Peugeot 5 Concept that premiered at the 2010 Geneva Motor Show, the 2011 Peugeot 508 puts the verve – that oh-so-important French flair – back into Peugeot’s line-up.

We take the wheel of Peugeot’s flagship, AU$52,990 508 GT with a 2.2-liter turbocharged diesel and a 6-speed automatic for a week-long road test and review.

Read more »

Car Game Review: "Driver: San Francisco"

Picture this: you’re chasing down an escaped con in a stolen police van when one of his buddies rams your police cruiser off the road. No matter, as you can jump out of your body and into that of suburban soccer mom, using her minivan to disable the escapee and complete the mission.

This is the main gimmick of Driver: San Francisco, the latest in a long-line of cops ‘n’ robbers driving games from developer Ubisoft. And it works, thanks to intuitive game play mechanics and missions that encourage thinking outside the box.

Read more »

Car Movie Review: Super Hybrid

Tilda’s (Shannon Beckner) life is less than perfect: her boyfriend is a layabout body builder who refuses to work because of a back injury, her boss (Oded Fehr) is a sexist asshat who has just passed her over for a promotion and her estranged nephew (Ryan Kennedy) talks about her behind her back.

She works at the 29th District Garage in Chicago, the place where all the accident vehicles go. The garage’s latest resident is a near-totaled Chevrolet Nova with a matte black paint job.

Only this isn’t just any old car: it’s actually a shape-shifting, man-eating killing machine! With the garage closed for renovations over the weekend and our band of misfits sealed in, it is a race to survive against nature’s smartest – and most devious – predator.

Read more »

iPhone Video Review of New BMW 1-Series

British motoring show Fifth Gear flew over to Germany to try out the new 2012 BMW 1-Series hatchback.

The TV show's crew was going to film the first test drive of the Bavarian model on a normal camera but a mishap forced them to shoot the entire clip through one of their Apple iPhones (it probably looks better than it sounds).

Read more »

Video: MT Drives the New 2013 Chevrolet Malibu

We won't be seeing the new 2013 Chevrolet Malibu in U.S. showrooms until after next year's Super Bowl XLVI, but GM is already handing out early prototypes to journalists for a first encounter with the mid-size sedan.

This time, it's Motor Trend magazine editor Todd Lassa who was handed the keys to Chevrolet's newcomer. However, being that the example he drove and which you can see in the video after the hump, isn't a final production model but a showcar, there wasn't much to say about the Malibu's handling or other characteristics.

Read more »

First Drive: 2011 Holden Cruze Series II SRI-V

Appearing soon after General Motors announced its Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing, the Cruze – which launched in Oz almost two years ago– aims to appeal to buyers that would normally not buy a Holden. Its key competitors in the Australian market are the Toyota Corolla, Mazda3 and the (European) Ford Focus.

With the recent launch of the Aussie-built Cruze Series II, we thought it was about time we tackled GM’s “game changing” small car. The 1.4 L turbo is said to be the cherry on top of the Cruze cake, and the perfect target for a review. The question is: can it live up to the hype? Read on…

Read more »

Holden Ute Series II SS V8 Arrives in Carscoop’s Garage

Our man Tristan has snagged the keys to a Holden Ute Series II SS V8 model for a first drive in Queensland, Australia this week, and just to make it a bit more interesting, he’ll be driving the Down Under-flavored El Camino to a classic car gathering in Brisbane.

Blurring the line between cars and trucks, the Holden Commodore-based sport pickup comes from a long line of Utes dating back to the middle of the previous century. The Ute almost made it to North America when Pontiac revealed the G8 Sport Truck at the 2008 New York Auto Show, but GM’s growing financial troubles at the time put a stop to that plan, and eventually the brand itself which was discontinued in 2009, and finally shut down in 2010.

Read more »

First Drive of Nissan’s 2011 Murano CrossCabriolet

Having been invited out to the seaside town of Del Mar in California for the presentation of the new Murano CrossCabriolet, we were intrigued at the chance to take Nissan's polarizing convertible out for a spin. That's right, the Murano convertible. How did things play out in California? Interesting, to say the least.

With the Murano CC, Nissan has gone outside the box to create its own niche. Looks aside, the Murano CC has done what it set out to do: garner interest, spur conversation, expand the model range, and change (not necessarily raise) the bar for mid-size crossovers. For all the ups and downs, read on.

It's a crossover...convertible

Nissan's Murano CC is a two-door convertible crossover that sits at the top of the Murano heap, creating a unique halo vehicle for the brand's crossover segment. While the CC's design is a love-it or hate-it affair, there's no doubt that we can all agree on one aspect: it doesn't come off nearly as badly as those photoshops which alluded to an aftermarket convertible conversion.

Read more »