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I've always been a fan of the S-Class.
But the A8 will always be my favourite in that sedan class.
That ambient lighting..... my goodness im in love
Imagine you're on a date with a dope little chick and before you drop her off at her crib yall sit in the whip and talk.
Hit those lights and shorty is giving it up within 3 min
A8 are nice and ol boy is right you don't see too many of them on the roadI've always been a fan of the S-Class.
But the A8 will always be my favourite in that sedan class.
Game changing technology? Cadillac has had ambient lighting in the streets for a while, now...
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Dog hop on it soon, I work at a Benz dealer here in Indy and we're already at 40 pre-orders... and this is in Indianapolis. Had a dealer meeting a few weeks ago regarding this vehicle and I honestly would choose this over any full size luxury sedan in the world. ***** crazy man, better than a Bentley IMO
Can't wait to take a look at this in person and most likely trade my 08 s550 in for this
Yea, I like what i've seen in like 10 videos already but still wanna sit in the back for myself. Was playing with the configurator and it looks like its gonna come out to like 130-135k for a s550 compared to when I got my 08 one for 106k loaded. Guess they charging for all this tech but I need a sedan to be driven in, got too many coupes and a SUV already.
Dog hop on it soon, I work at a Benz dealer here in Indy and we're already at 40 pre-orders... and this is in Indianapolis. Had a dealer meeting a few weeks ago regarding this vehicle and I honestly would choose this over any full size luxury sedan in the world. ***** crazy man, better than a Bentley IMO
I like the rear seat massaging chair and the technology package the most. I think there's roughly 18 speakers inside the car if you get the technology package. My ***** thats gotta sound like you in the IMAX theatre. This model year, they've definitely focused on the technology inside the car though and its unreal. With all the options and what not, definitely going to be around $140K though. If you're looking to just be driven around in, look into the single pay lease option. More affordable up front cost and you don't have to pay for the depreciation that you would in contrast to owning/financing. Just depends on how often you drive the carYea, I like what i've seen in like 10 videos already but still wanna sit in the back for myself. Was playing with the configurator and it looks like its gonna come out to like 130-135k for a s550 compared to when I got my 08 one for 106k loaded. Guess they charging for all this tech but I need a sedan to be driven in, got too many coupes and a SUV already.
Dog hop on it soon, I work at a Benz dealer here in Indy and we're already at 40 pre-orders... and this is in Indianapolis. Had a dealer meeting a few weeks ago regarding this vehicle and I honestly would choose this over any full size luxury sedan in the world. ***** crazy man, better than a Bentley IMO
Since u work there what u like most bout it?
Mercedes S550: A Technological Tour de Force Though its styling is far from a wow, the Mercedes S550 is a masterpiece of gadgetry and gee-whiz innovation
THE REDESIGNED 2014 Mercedes-Benz S-class, the serene, cetacean presence you see before you, this sack of krill, is probably the world's most technologically rich automobile.
Though the Mercedes-Benz S550 is far from being pretty, it could one day be pronounced the best car in the world, says Rumble Seat columnist Dan Neil.
The company's new flagship sedan/limousine/state car requires the services of 60 onboard computers, up to 100 servo motors (operating, among other things, the powered door and trunk closures, seat-belt tensioners, and the elaborate articulation of the seats), and more than 500 LED lighting units, from its taillamps to its (amazing, game-changing) headlamps. Under the flat, brooding instrument binnacle are two high-res, 12.3-inch TFT screens, arrayed cinema style in a single, broad bezel that, at night, floats in a pool of suffused LED backlighting, like something signed out from the Starfleet motor pool. Holy mother of awesome.
Photos: 2014 Mercedes-Benz S550
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Dan Neil/The Wall Street Journal
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Gorden Wagener, Mercedes-Benz head of design, told me that the new S-class was the "best car in the world." I am not ready to make such a pronouncement, and I'd be unlikely to do so anyway about a car that looks like it was swallowed by a manatee. But the S-class is unquestionably a tour de force, a showy, almost arrogant display of auto-making genius (assuming it all holds together). The important thing here is Stuttgart's willingness to invoke "best car" verbiage, which historians associate with icons such as the Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost, Duesenberg SJ, Mercedes-Benz 300SL, Bugatti Veyron and—a late entry on the list—Tesla. Cheeky monkeys.
For four decades and five generations of the S-class, the car has traditionally been the company's technology icebreaker, introducing now-fundamental systems such as stability control and ABS braking, adaptive cruise control and adaptive body-roll control. In that time, S-class product planning has also become increasingly a victim of its own rhetoric, with each generation obliged to blow buyers' minds anew, sometimes with trivial, half-baked "technologies" (the shambolic first edition of the infrared night-vision system comes to mind).
This new car represents a genuine break with the past on several fronts, and they are, in descending order of importance: active safety; cabin materials and construction; in-cabin electronic functions and amenities. Indeed, the sheer weight of innovation in this car—more than 2,000 patents flutter in its slipstream—is itself theatrical, a message to consumers and competitors alike: A giant has awakened. Checkbooks, run for your lives.
It almost doesn't matter where you start. Would you like to know about the perfume injection integrated into the cabin air-filtration system, offering one of four fragrances (human-factors approved, I'm sure) held in a cut-glass reservoir in the glove compartment? German engineering meets John Waters's Odorama.
Here's a fun one: Magic Body Control, which uses stereoscopic cameras integrated into the windshield header to read the road ahead, looking for shadow and contrast that might indicate a perturbation in pavement, so it can instantly adjust the air suspension in anticipation of the bump. The "magic" part is that it seems to make speed bumps disappear.
“Pity about the styling. This isn't within 10,000 kilometers of 'pretty.'”
Among other things, Mercedes is attempting to reassert its incumbency as the safest car in the world. To that end, a fully equipped S550 (figure $135,000) is like a freaking Awacs plane, with the aforementioned stereo cameras, long-range thermal imaging (Night Vision Assist with active pedestrian illumination), and a dozen or so ultrasonic and radar-based sensors that create a multi-wavelength, 3-D map of the world around the car.
This "sensor fusion" is fed into the car's driver-assist systems, including: Distronic Plus; active lane-keeping; all-speed adaptive cruise control ("Stop and Go Pilot") that follows the flow of congested traffic without driver intervention; and active lane-departure correction, which nudges the car back in a lane via asymmetric application of the front brakes. These technologies, which Mercedes collectively calls "Intelligent Drive," basically give the car situational awareness.
Example: With its array of rear sensors, the car can detect the threat of an impending rear collision and react, by going into crash-hardening mode, cinching down the passenger seat belts, rolling the windows up, and locking the brakes, to reduce the delta-v—the violence of the crash, in other words—and minimize the risk of the car's being thrown forward into another vehicle or an intersection. In Euro-spec cars, the brilliant LED taillights strobe to alert the driver of the closing car (U.S. regs currently limit strobing lights to emergency and official vehicles).
I know what you're thinking: Who knew you could be this fascinated and bored at the same time? But the degree to which all this approaches a reliable, robust, autopilot feature—Mercedes goes so far as to use the phrase "semiautonomous"—makes the S-class historically significant. Daimler has invested heavily in driver-assist and crash-avoidance/mitigation-systems research over the past decade, as well as advanced research in human factors engineering. Now the company is beginning to commercialize these investments.
2014 Mercedes-Benz S550
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Mercedes Benz
Base price: $92,900
Price, as tested: $125,000 (est)
Powertrain: Twin-turbocharged and intercooled direct-injection 4.6-liter V8; seven-speed torque converter automatic with multi-mode manual shift; rear-wheel drive with electronic limited-slip differential.
Horsepower/torque: 449 at 5,500 rpm; 516 pound-feet of torque at 1,800 rpm
Length/weight: 206.5 inches/4,500 pounds (est)
Wheelbase: 124.6 inches
0-60 mph: