The interior of the 2018 Mazda6 Signature is simply a class above. Though I do have three very minor complaints, it’s a total winner. Let me walk you through it:
The drivers side door (not to mention the rest of the car) has a mix of Nappa leather, aluminum, Sen wood and Ultrasuede accents that really gives an upscale feel to the interior. Along with piano black accents around the buttons.
I’m zooming on the stitching, wood and aluminum accents that show how well this is all done. Clearly a lot of time and attention went into this.
Bose supplies the audio. I’ll talk about that more in tomorrow’s review of the technology in the vehicle.
There are red puddle lights on all the doors for added safety.
Here on the drivers side of the Mazda6, there’s all the controls for the electronic overseers, the hood, gas cap, and trunk releases. Along with the pedals including a dead pedal. It’s all very functional, but if Mazda wanted to kick things up a notch, they could have included aluminum pedals to give it a bit of a sporty or upscale feel.
The driver and passenger get 10 way adjustable nappa leather seats that are heated and cooled. The seats are very supportive as long as you dial it in to fit your body. Once you dial it in, it has memory settings to memorize those settings.
The steering wheel is leather wrapped, heated, and has controls for the infotainment system and cruise controls. You can’t see them here, but there are paddle shifters on the back of the steering wheel. They’re plastic which works. But given the amount of detail that you’re going to see in the rest of the interior, aluminum paddle shifters might kick things up a notch.
Though the picture isn’t straight, you can clearly see the gauges. Now the one in the center is completely digital and customizable. The outside gauges are analog.
The 8″ Infotainment screen is mounted on top of the dash and is easy to read in any light. The start/stop button for the engine is to the left of it.
There’s dual zone climate control below the infotainment screen. The display related to this is digital and easy to read in all lighting conditions.
There’s a cubby that is below the HVAC controls that fit my iPhone 7 Plus.
Here you see the leather wrapped shifter, the sport switch, electronic parking brake, a button that holds the brakes on a hill, and the HMI commander switch for the infotainment system. There’s a door to the right of all of that….
…..That has a pair of cupholders…..
…..which holds a Venti sized Starbucks coffee with ease.
There’s a very deep central storage area with a 12V outlet as well as 2 USB ports and a 3.5 mm audio jack. When this is closed, you have a handy arm rest.
Why am I showing you the rear view mirror? It’s frameless. What that does is give you a bit more in terms of viewable area. Which in turn gave me amazing amounts of rear visibility.
The glovebox is average sized and was occupied the owners manuals.
You get a decent sized moonroof. The glass portion is powered, but the sunshade isn’t. My wife commented that having both powered would have been cool. I can see her point. But that’s really not a deal breaker.
The rear seat will fit two adults with ease as I was able to “sit behind myself” which is no small feat as I am 6 feet tall. Three adults may be a stretch if the person who sits in the middle is tall. My wife is 5′ 6″ and her head almost touched the roof in that position. Three kids back here would be no issue.
If you don’t need to seat three in the back, you can flip this down and get a couple of cupholders and the controls for the rear heated seats.
You can also open it for some storage as well as a pair of USB ports.
There’s ventilation in the back.
All the interior lighting is LED based which is very upscale and pleasing to the eye.
The trunk is very large as well as having the hinges boxed in so that they don’t crush anything beneath them. On the left and right sides are recessed storage areas so that you can keep stuff in there and not have it slide around the trunk.
It held our weekly grocery shopping haul with lots of space left over.
There’s a handle on the inside of the trunk that allows you to close it without getting your hands dirty.
This Signature trim level really is impressive. And any criticisms that I mentioned are really minor as these are areas where Mazda could have taken an impressive interior, and made it perfect. To be frank, I’ve been in luxury vehicles that aren’t as good as this. If you spend any time in it, you’ll be impressed as much as I was.
Tomorrow I will discuss the technology in the Mazda6, and there’s a lot of it. Stay tuned!
500K Routers Worldwide Pwned By VPNFilter Malware
Posted in Commentary with tags Security on May 23, 2018 by itnerdCisco’s Talos Intelligence Group is sounding the alarm about a new type of malware called VPNFilter. The malware contains a killswitch for routers, can steal logins and passwords and can monitor industrial control systems. And an attack would have the potential to cut off internet access for all the devices connected to the router. Ukraine seems to be particularly hard hit, which combined with what has been discovered about the malware, implies that this is Russian in origin.
Routers from Linksys, MikroTik, Netgear and TP-Link are affected. Netgear has suggested to users everywhere to upgrade the firmware on their routers. Nobody else seems to have any specific advice for users of their products. Which is of course bad.
In terms of protecting yourself, here’s the best that from Cisco’s Talos Intelligence group:
And that’s pretty much all the average end user can do. Hopefully more robust advice comes in the days ahead as this is far from trivial.
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