The IT Nerd

So I’ve come to the end of my time with the Buick Regal Turbo. I have to say that even though I entered this review with the knowledge that Buick was trying to change the image of what their cars are, I was blown away with the degree of change. This week I had a car that in every way was great to drive, and had plenty of power and luxury as well. From a technology standpoint, the addition of a WiFi hotspot and Siri Eyes Free combined with really useful safety technology really made this a vehicle that I could see myself in. If Buick’s mission was to produce cars that would get buyers like me who would normally not think twice about Buick into showrooms, I can safely say that their mission is accomplished.

My final fuel economy was 11 L/100 KM’s in mixed city and highway driving. That wasn’t bad given that I was really utilizing the capabilities of the Regal. Driving more sensibly would have yielded better results I believe which is good given that the Regal uses premium gas.

So, what is this particular Buick Regal Turbo going to cost you? As equipped, it goes for $46,120. But it starts at $39,465 which means that it is completely in line with competitions like the BMW 3 series, Audi A4, Mercedes Benz C Class just to name a few. Given how it performs, it doesn’t just compete on price either. Perhaps the competition needs to look over their shoulder.

Take it from me, this isn’t your dad’s Buick. One drive and you’ll see why.

The technology in the Buick Regal Turbo is very interesting and some of it is unique. Let me start with driving the Regal. You get a proximity key with push button start. Thus all you have to do is press a button on the door handle. Press it and the car will unlock. One thing to note is all the door handles have buttons. That way nobody has to wait for the driver to unlock the car. That’s a nice touch. When you get in the Regal, the seat slides forward to the last position that it was set to. Hit the start/stop button and drive away. When you’ve reached your destination, press the start/stop button to turn off the car. Then get out of the car. The seat will slide back to give you room once you open the door. Though I will note that the person behind you will have almost no legroom once that happens. Thus you should wait until they are out of the car before opening the door. You then close the door and walk away. You’ll hear a honk to tell you that the car has locked itself. At no time do need to pull out the key fob to do any of this. But the key fob does have the ability to lock and unlock the doors as well as pop the trunk, plus it has the ever useful panic button. As an added bonus, it has a backup key should you need it.

Now over to the safety systems:

• The Regal has Forward Collision Alert technology which helps to prevent frontal crashes by sensing when you are approaching a vehicle in front of you too quickly and alerts you with both an audible and visual warning.
• You also get Adaptive Cruise Control which senses vehicles in front of you and continually and seamlessly adjusts speed to maintain your preferred following distance. I must admit that I loved this when I was on long highway drives.
• Besides having a backup camera (which is exposed to the elements by the way) you get Rear Cross Traffic Alert technology which uses radar to detect vehicles or even people in some cases approaching the Regal when you’re backing up and alerts you when one comes within 20 metres of either side of the Regal. I really like how Buick has implemented this as it alerts you with a red exclamation mark on the side that the object is approaching from. Plus it has sensors that are used to help you to avoid objects while reversing, such as a parked car that is behind you.
• You also get Side Blind Zone Alert which issues a visual warning when a vehicle coming alongside enters your blind zone. And when you’re changing lanes, Lane Change Alert uses radar to watch for and warn you of vehicles approaching quickly from behind.
• The Regal warns you when you’re leaving your lane with audible beeps on the side of the car that is drifting out of the lane.

That brings us to the infotainment system. Called Buick IntelliLink, this system has a number of things going for it starting with the 8″ touchscreen that was clear and easy to read in any lighting situation. Other highlights include:

• The user interface is clear and easy to pick up, plus it has redundant buttons below it for things like radio and media.
• Paring my iPhone 6 via Bluetooth was a trivial process that didn’t require opening the manual.
• The fact that I have an iPhone 6 was handy because I got to leverage a feature called Siri Eyes Free. This allowed me to use Siri to read and reply to text messages, start and stop music, choose playlists, or anything else I wanted to do.
• Audio was great thanks to the 9 speaker Bose system. Audiophiles will love being in the Regal.
• One really nice touch is that when you make a phone call, the HVAC system drops the speed of the fans so that you can hear the other person. The second that the call is over, it returns the HVAC system to normal. I love that! 

One note that I have to make is that I tried to plug in my iPhone 6 into the supplied USB ports and other than charging the phone, it did not load my music into IntelliLink. I then tried my wife’s iPhone 6 and got the same result. From there, I tried my iPhone 5s and a Samsung Galaxy S3 and got the same result. That’s when I reached out to Buick USA tech support via a chat service that they have on their website and they suggested trying different cables as well as taking a thumb drive formatted using he FAT32 filesystem with a few songs on it to test the USB ports. Neither worked. Thus I have to conclude that the ports were defective, this is expected behavior, or I am doing something wrong. I have reached out to GM Canada for feedback, and if I get something back, I will update this post.

One really unique feature is that the Regal came with OnStar 4G LTE WiFi. This feature allows you to use your car as a WiFi hotspot for up to seven devices. I only got up to four in my testing but I had zero complaints. I was able to connect easily and the speed was pretty good. I should also mention the RemoteLink app that allows you to unlock the car and get status updates about the health of the car from the smartphone. Plus you get all the usual features of OnStar including:

• Remote diagnostics
• Navigation
• emergency help including automatic crash response
• Security in the form of tracking your car if it is stolen and helping law enforcement get the bad guys who took it.

I’ve written a bit more in depth article on OnStar 4G LTE here that you might want to read if you want to know what this system is capable of and what it will cost. But if you have a family, you might want to consider getting it as it will keep the occupants of the Regal happy during long drives.

In the final part of my review of the Buick Regal Turbo, I’ll tie up some loose ends and give you my verdict. Stay tuned!

The interior of the Buick Regal Turbo is easily on par with what you find on cars from the usual German and Japanese luxury suspects. Let me take you through the interior from front to back:

The driver’s seat is 10 way adjustable and is heated. It’s a bit wide for my tastes, but it is comfortable and the leather is nice. The front passenger gets the same treatment by the way.

The level of detail is high in the Regal. Take the driver’s door for example. Besides the fact that all the door, window, trunk, and mirror controls are on the door, the wood, leather and chrome that’s on the door is straight off the top shelf. Also, the stitching on any surface that I examined was exceptionally well done.

Audio is provided by Bose and it sounds great.

To the left of the steering wheel, there’s the controls for the exterior lights.

Below that is a cubby for change or other small items that is handy to have.

The instrument cluster is pretty interesting. Even in lighting conditions like the one that this picture was taken in, the gauges were easy to read. The center portion can be customized to display whatever info you’re interested in. Not only that, but navigation info is replicated here which saves you from having to glance at the touchscreen.

The steering wheel is leather wrapped and heated. It has redundant controls for the audio, plus it has controls for the cruise control, phone and the instrument cluster. I really liked the feel of it in my hands.

Why am I showing you the rear view mirror? Note the buttons on the bottom. Those are for OnStar which is exclusive to GM vehicles. I’ll go into more detail about what OnStar can do for you tomorrow.

The center console is interesting. You get a good sized touchscreen and CD player. You also get a mix of buttons for the infotainment and HVAC controls along with touch sensitive surfaces to set the temperature and seat heaters. The latter doesn’t work if you’re wearing gloves, and they proved to be a bit finicky.

There’s a small space below that for small objects and it has a 12V outlet.

The shifter is leather wrapped and has chrome accents that look good. Below that, you can see the electronic parking brake as well as another space for small items like coins.

You get a pair of cupholders and you have a sliding cover to put them out of sight.

 They easily hold a Venti sized coffee from Starbucks.

There is a very small storage area beneath the armrest. Here you get a 12v outlet and two USB ports along with an 1/8″ audio port and SD card reader.

There’s a decent sized glove box and though you can’t see it in this picture, it is lit.

You get a good sized moonroof in the Regal to let some extra light in.

The back seats has plenty of room for two adults or three kids.

If you don’t need to seat three people, you can use this flip down section that has a storage area as well as two cupholders.

There’s HVAC vents for rear passengers along with…

…. A 110V outlet. Handy for charging your tablet or phone.

The trunk is shallow in terms of the depth, but it is long and there’s a lot of space here as evidenced here by our trip for groceries as well as beer. Note the fact that the hinges are enclosed so that they don’t crush anything beneath them.

There’s a handle on the trundled that makes it easy to close the trunk without getting your hands dirty.

As I said earlier, this interior is extremely well executed. Clearly a lot of time and effort was put in to make this interior as good as it is. I’m pretty sure that if you benchmark it against the usual suspects from Germany and Japan, you’ll find that it will hold its own easily against them.

Tomorrow I will be looking at the technology in the Regal and it has a lot of it. Including some items that are unique. Stay tuned!