Hasta La Gadget!

The beer commercials were flat and most dot-com ads except Groupon kept intact their string of cluelessness. So Super Bowl 45 (XLV to traditionalists) was rescued by the slew of car ads. VW, Chrysler, and parts of GM got the most out of their investments. Among Germany’s Big Three luxury makers, Audi, BMW, and Mercedes-Benz ran 1-2-3 in a race to convince the public at large which unaffordable super-luxury brand you should most look up to. Chevrolet had one of the worst ads (Chevy Cruze) that was even less understandable (and thus less embarrassing) if you watched the big game in a noisy room. Here are the best and some other notable outliers.

The last century saw no shortage of disputes between the French and the Germans, but in this century everything’s going to be totally cool. BMW and PSA Peugeot Citroën, the company that quite naturally owns the Peugeot and Citroën marques, have come to form a partnership focused on the creation of advanced hybrid systems. The name for this new partnership? BMW Peugeot Citroën Electrification, quite naturally. The fruit of this holy union will be better battery packs, generators, and electronics that will not only help the manufacturers that have joined together here, but will also be sold to other manufacturers who need a little help from their friends. We’ll have to wait a little while before we see any results, though: actual components aren’t expected to hit the road until 2014 at the earliest — coincidently about 100 years since things got awfully testy at Alsace-Lorraine.

Continue reading BMW and PSA Peugeot Citroen partner for future hybrid tech, put that Great War thing behind them

BMW and PSA Peugeot Citroen partner for future hybrid tech, put that Great War thing behind them originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 02 Feb 2011 20:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Near Field Communication (NFC) is shaping up to be one of the hottest tech trends for 2011 now that payment systems and new handsets (driven by the Gingerbread build of Android and presumably, a near-term iOS release) are making their way into the US and Europe. Add BMW to the growing list of supporters with its NFC key of the future. Bimmer researchers envision linking the key to the car’s navigation and entertainment system allowing you to make hotel reservations or purchase train tickets, for example. You could then download the ticket directly from your car to the key which could then be used to board the train. Later, a key linked to your banking information could even be used to settle the hotel bill. BMW believes its approach is more secure than that of an NFC-enabled cellphone because its system is both closed and encrypted. Possibly. But we’re still more likely to have our cellphone in a pocket while traveling than the key to a car parked a few hundred miles away. Of course, there’s nothing preventing us from tapping the key to our cellphone and transferring the data — it is still in the R&D phase for the next generation of ConnectedDrive after all. Click through for the video.

Continue reading BMW’s NFC Key is your ticket to ride, and you should care (video)

BMW’s NFC Key is your ticket to ride, and you should care (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 02 Feb 2011 06:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Turns out we were way off on this whole car of tomorrow business. According to BMW the car of tomorrow is a form-fitting suit with unflattering horizontal lines and ball-bearing shoes. Or, maybe it’s a kind of bat winged jacket that attaches to a collapsible scooter… thing. That one’s called Flymag, pictured above, which converts into a backpack and apparently makes you FOF when you sit on it. These concepts and more are courtesy of FDI, the International Design School in Barcelona, and are on display through the end of this month at Rambla de Catalunya. Go see them now before they’re relegated to the annals of yesterday’s crazy visions for tomorrow.

BMW’s visions for future mobility look as ridiculous as they are impractical originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 25 Jan 2011 08:58:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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At CES and the NAIAS in Detroit this year we saw ever more powerful smartphone integration, but nothing like this. Nokia Asia teamed up with two Chinese coders, An Jiaxuan and an unnamed friend, to whip up a C7 app that controls a BMW 1 Series. They said it took them only 20 days to get things ready but we’re thinking adding the remote controls to the car itself must have added some further time to that. The result is in the video below, a short test drive that Nokia promises “isn’t special effects.” See for yourself and let us know if you spot a meatbag driver hiding in there somewhere.

Continue reading BMW gets Nokia C7 remote control, James Bond can eat his heart out (video)

BMW gets Nokia C7 remote control, James Bond can eat his heart out (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 20 Jan 2011 11:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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