Autos

The Bugatti Royale returns, but this time, it’s not as a car. Instead, the French automaker pins the name to a new home audio system it’s created in conjunction with Tidal, the lossless audio—and high-definition video—streaming service.  Like the Bugatti Type 41 Royale of the late 1920s, the Royale home audio system features imposing proportions and art-deco design. Each of these grand gadgets houses four subwoofers, a three-way front speaker with a midrange driver, and a diamond-diaphragm tweeter—the latter of which Bugatti also includes in its four-wheeled machines. A matching music controller completes the kit. While the Royale’s technology may impress audiophiles (or possibly leave them wanting—we’ll leave that to the expert audiophiles to determine), the s...

The timed lap was done in early November and was certified by the data-logging mavens at Vbox. The Taycan Turbo S that Keen piloted came wearing Pirelli P Zero NFO Elect tires straight from the factory—some stickier rubber no doubt would have shaved a second (perhaps even more) off of the record time. Turbo S models also come with all the go-fast goodies you can get for the Taycan, including carbon ceramic brakes, active anti-roll bars, and rear wheel steering. For a little context, Keen’s 1 minute, 33.88 second lap was 3.7 seconds slower than MotorTrend hot shoe Randy Pobst managed in the much lighter, much more hardcore, and much more track-ready C7 Corvette Z06. Even though three seconds is a long time in the world of racing, the fact that an EV even got close to that time is...

Porsche says the new car, derived from the street-legal 911, is up to one percent faster per lap than 991.2-based GT3 Cup; around which track isn’t clear, so we think the automaker is referring to a general projected average here. “So what?” you might be thinking. While just one solitary percent of one solitary lap doesn’t sound that incredible, when added up over the course of dozens (if not hundreds) of laps, it makes a huge difference. Part of that seemingly small lap-time shave comes from a little extra power. The new GT3 Cup’s 4.0-liter, water-cooled flat-six now makes 510 hp, 25 more than its predecessor. It’ll rev to 8,400 rpm (up from 7,400) and can also, for the first time, be run on synthetic fuels. Porsche has been looking heavily into alterna...

Imagine an electric car battery that provides more than 300 miles of range, charges in approximately ten minutes, requires no bulky heating and cooling systems, maintains 80 percent of its charge capacity for 800 cycles (about 240,000 miles), and isn’t prone to spontaneous combustion. Such is the promise of the solid-state car battery, a holy grail that automakers and manufacturers are racing to find. Now, Toyota announced it’ll have a running prototype with a solid-state battery ready by next year. Before you yawn and click the back button on your browser, consider the implications of this technology. Range and charge times are the biggest barriers to EV adoption, and while a ten-minute charge is still quite a bit longer than it takes to fill a gas tank with liquid fuel, ...

While any Alfa Romeo 4C is highly limited simply by nature—it hasn’t exactly been a sales success—the Italian brand has announced more details of a special version of the carbon-fiber sports car, the 4C Spider 33 Stradale Tributo. It honors one of its most legendary historic models and also serves as the final version of the car built for the North American market. The original 33 Stradale is of course the sensational and highly limited road version of the Tipo 33 race car that was campaigned around the globe starting in 1967. The Stradale was produced from 1967 to 1969, with just 18 being built overall; its rarity, as well as its sultry bodywork, places the value of the original cars north of $10 million. Provided you can find someone willing to sell, of course. For its pa...

The two Bollinger model’s designs have been massaged, and both look a little different than the B1 and B2 show vehicles of yore. The B1 and B2 benefit from a taller belt line, which helps lower the models’ visual mass for a less top-heavy look. The updated design nets more passenger headroom and a bigger frunk. Cargo space is also greater within the B1 SUV’s cabin. Bollinger says that some of the models’ extra frunk room is devoted to a new thermal management system. The new unit is now mounted in the front of the bumper where it receives better airflow. It replaces the earlier concepts’ two top-mounted radiators. This change also allowed Bollinger to slim down the models’ headlights, pushing the units further toward the far edges of the front fascia. Se...

‘Tis the season … for those luxury car commercials in which people with more money than you take advantage of year-end deals and gift their significant others a new Lexus, Infiniti, Mercedes-Benz, or Audi for the holidays. As many folks have pointed out on social media in recent weeks, this is borderline psychopathic behavior. Who makes such a huge purchase without involving their life partner? Saturday Night Live jumped into the debate this weekend with the skit “December to Remember,” satirizing Lexus’s holiday deal branding and pointing out exactly why one doesn’t just go out and buy a Lexus and have it wrapped in a bow for Christmas. Okay, so the punchline for the skit is obvious—”Give the gift of Lexus, definitely talk it over first”—but...

Hear that gentle hum slowly rising to a steady whine? That’s the forthcoming tsunami of German-developed electric vehicles rushing toward the horizon as part of a global push toward electrification. Across the board, it seems every German automaker is finally shaking the diesel soot from its boots and gearing up sales skirmishes against one another—alongside a full-frontal assault on Tesla. As part of this rising wave, Mercedes-Benz just outlined its timetable for its EQ-line of EVs. Mercedes-Benz EQ: Crossovers Come First While Mercedes-Benz’s EQ sub-brand is technically already in production with the EQC, the company’s latest push for EQ is centered around new EVs built on a bespoke platform (as opposed to the EQC’s rejiggered GLC-Class bones), the first of which ...

The current Subaru WRX and WRX STI have been with us for a good long while now—seven model years, to be exact. Over the course of this time, we’ve seen a number of special editions, including the all-conquering S209 (the formerly JDM-only special). But the base cars themselves have been given only incremental improvements—not to mention a small facelift for 2018. For 2021, the WRX and WRX STI live on for what should amount to their final lap around the sun. All-new iterations of the Subaru performance sedans are expected to arrive for the 2022 model year. The only change to the 2021 WRX is the addition of a standard proximity key with push-button start on Premium trims. Aside from that one small change, the rest of the WRX line is indiscernible from its 2020 counterpart. As a result ...