[Saywell]

Afternoon All,

Having had 2 years of Alfa free motoring I'm looking at the Cloverleaf.

Went to my dealer in Nottingham who took me out in a lovely black one. Having read many reviews I was prepared for rattles, bad quality, bumpy ride, offset wheel and pedals..

How wrong of me to trust the reviewers.. I was very surprised with how the car handled some quite poor roads - i was expecting to be shaken out of the car!!

So... my current car is with me till March - when I will buy and then sell on, I will then be looking for a Cloverleaf.

The only question is options - I will probably go for a used model so I may have to wait to find the right spec.

Could you guys give me some pointers on some of the available options; whether or not the are any good.

Xenon Headlights?
Bose upgrade?
Built in Sat Nav?
Heated Seats?
Electric Seats?
Anything else?

Andy

 

[Tirreni]

Hi!

I have the xenons and they're excellent. I also have the tomtom option and that is excellent too - am currently in Italy with a hired G which has the built in radionav and it is irritating the cr*p out of me after less than a week, and that's without its inability to take full UK postcodes.

I have the heated/electric/leather seats and without wishing to sound like a broken record they're excellent too!

Think about the rear parking sensors....

I don't have the Bose, but I reckon the standard ICE isn't bad - good enough for me with an iPod plugged into the USB in the glove box.

 

[micsanderson]

Hi,

I have a G cloverleaf, it has heated seats, parking sensors, built in sat nav (don't do it, get the tomtom, unless you want the other bits that come with it), power folding mirrors. My next one would have been xenon but the budget didnt stretch to it, and I didn't want full leather but that's personal preference.

The office is in Derby (pride park) if you want to have a play with any of my options, or a look around the car away from the dealers, feel free to come and meet me, and I'll show you what I've done with the ICE as a bose (many say better than bose in this instance) alternative.

Mic

 

[Saywell]

Thanks guys - pretty much along the same lines as the sales guy; which is good.

Did a quick config on the web-site - just under £31k..

So I'm looking for the electrically heated and adjusted seats, rear parking sensors (unless they spoil the back side?), xenons, and the tom tom thingy on the dash (which is now free on new ones..)

Cheers

Andy

 

[djarte]

Hi Alfisti friends.

Since i am waitting for my G Cloverleaf and since i decided to go with the sat nav system, can you please tell me the negatives of this option? I am reading lot of dissapointment users but till now i can not find an explanation based on specific facts.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Spyder]

The builtin Satnav is ok, not a patch on a TomTom, my main issue with mine is the TMC doesn't work and dealers no help with it (think its beyond their capabilities. Things you get with a TomTom that you don't get with builtin are speed camera alerts, decent POIs, and the ability to customise its content. I do like the builtins integration with the rest of the system for playing music and controlling phone

 

[Tirreni]

Thanks guys - pretty much along the same lines as the sales guy; which is good.

Did a quick config on the web-site - just under £31k..

So I'm looking for the electrically heated and adjusted seats, rear parking sensors (unless they spoil the back side?), xenons, and the tom tom thingy on the dash (which is now free on new ones..)

Cheers

Andy

About what I paid for mine.

The sensors set pretty discreet - 4 small slightly recessed circles smaller than a 10p. As I'm abroad I haven't got access to my picture library to post a picture here but I think there might be a shot of my QV's rear end in my gallery.

(Edit: checked my gallery and there doesn't seem to be a pic of the rear end, but look at the rear 3/4 view of my last car, the Brera, and you can see how big the sensors are on that.)

 

[Tirreni]

Hi Alfisti friends.

Since i am waitting for my G Cloverleaf and since i decided to go with the sat nav system, can you please tell me the negatives of this option? I am reading lot of dissapointment users but till now i can not find an explanation based on specific facts.

Thanks in advance.

From my week's experience (so far) on he hire car the map style isn't as good as the tomtom, after having the car in D and having the turbo gauge etc on display it defaults back to he trip matter not he map (ok there maybe a setting I've missed as I haven't read the literature as it is a hire car!), plus what Spyder said.

 

[micsanderson]

You can't use full 7 digit UK post codes. I'm not sure this affects you as Germany use 5 digits if I remember correctly? If you use a 5 digit post code in UK (as I did today), then it gets you somewehre near and you put in the street name. But this seems to have its own problems - today i put in the first 5 digits of a post code, and it found the right town and region, but the street name didnt exist. Took the postcode out and put in town and street name and it went straight to it. Got home and put the post code into google maps, and it was correct. So why sat nav, why? It's happened lots in a similar fashion.

I can't find a way (i might be missing something?) to browse route, or to choose from several route, or to avoid a specific part of a route. When it diverts you for traffic, it simply says divert or not, and tells you how long it's lengthened or shortened by, no other info, those are your choices.

It keeps doing stupid things like telling me to come off the motorway at the slip road, take the second exit at the roundabout and get back on the same motorway - it somehow thinks this is quicker (even with a clear road) than staying on the motorway at a constant speed. That's ok when you know the road and ignore it but when it's doing that in an unfamiliar area and the road's are built up it's not that easy to spot on the sat nav you just waste your time and fuel.

It does the job. I use it, I don't use another. Am I disapointed after using a tomtom for years? Yes, very much so. A tomtom costs a few hundred at most, this cost over a grand. Would I have gone with the removable tomtom had I known it existed? Yes, I'd have had the xenons instead.

 

[Spyder]

I can't find a way (i might be missing something?) to browse route, or to choose from several route, or to avoid a specific part of a route. When it diverts you for traffic, it simply says divert or not, and tells you how long it's lengthened or shortened by, no other info, those are your choices.

It keeps doing stupid things like telling me to come off the motorway at the slip road, take the second exit at the roundabout and get back on the same motorway - it somehow thinks this is quicker (even with a clear road) than staying on the motorway at a constant speed. That's ok when you know the road and ignore it but when it's doing that in an unfamiliar area and the road's are built up it's not that easy to spot on the sat nav you just waste your time and fuel.

It does the job. I use it, I don't use another. Am I disapointed after using a tomtom for years? Yes, very much so. A tomtom costs a few hundred at most, this cost over a grand. Would I have gone with the removable tomtom had I known it existed? Yes, I'd have had the xenons instead.

I totally agree except for the diversion because TMC won't work on mine :rant:
I've also had it do the motorway trick on me plus there is a really good trick where it tells you to go left when the motorway splits then tells you you've gone the wrong way after you've turned. Does it to me every time on the M180 and caught me out the first time, took a 30 mile drive to get back where I wanted to be.

 

[djarte]

Thanks a lot folks!

It seems from what i am reading that the sat_nav system is not the correct choice after all. I took it mostly because i liked the lcd-screen and how it fits with the whole dashboard. I am still finding the TomTom solution a little bit ugly. Of course when you selecting a navigation system this should not be your first priority but after all i liked the whole idea. Fortunately here in Germany the post codes are 5-digit long so i guess i won't have the issue described for UK.

Another question i have is regarding the music playback during navigation. I am planning to by the blue&me bluetooth extender in order to pair my iphone and listen to music through bluetooth. I read somewhere that it is not possible to hear the voice guidance of the sat_nav system and listen to music at the same time. Can someone clarify this? I would expect that during the voice guidance the music volume should go down and then come back immediately. That is for example the behaviour in my iphone's navigation application.

Thanks in advance,

Artemios.

 

[Sparkplug155]

Hi
I have no experience of xenons but must say the std lights on mine are excellent.

 

[micsanderson]

In terms of Blue&Me, as it's new, you won't need the extender to work with your iphone. It's only cars of a certain age that do. Mine's a 2011 (December) and doesn't need it so yours shouldn't.

The sat nav will interrupt any other media playing (including iphone) and give instructions and then bring music back. As a preference, i have my satnav permenantly muted, and this means that nothing else bothers me.

Occasionally, on a night, i turn the screen off or tell it to fold itself away, and unmute it. That way i can hear voice instructions but don't have to have the screen on for long journeys in the dark.

 

[Saywell]

Another quick question.

When on the test drive; i asked about the 5 switches in the centre of the dash - there were two blank ones - sales guy said one will always be blank because of the start stop system the other was blank because the test car didn't have xenons.

Looked a bit sad having two empty switches - i appreciate that one will be blank because of the lack of start and stop, could someone tell me if its the middle button that is start and stop? (on/off switch) i think it was.

like things to be neat - so out of the 5 switches the middle one would be blank, the rest would do something if i went for xenons.

Strange one..

 

[Tirreni]

Pretty certain it is, with the sideways movement function of the xenons on the right. Looks nicely balanced if you have the xenons

 

[Oggy_GTA]

It keeps doing stupid things like telling me to come off the motorway at the slip road, take the second exit at the roundabout and get back on the same motorway - it somehow thinks this is quicker (even with a clear road) than staying on the motorway at a constant speed. That's ok when you know the road and ignore it but when it's doing that in an unfamiliar area and the road's are built up it's not that easy to spot on the sat nav you just waste your time and fuel.

It does the job. I use it, I don't use another. Am I disapointed after using a tomtom for years? Yes, very much so. A tomtom costs a few hundred at most, this cost over a grand. Would I have gone with the removable tomtom had I known it existed? Yes, I'd have had the xenons instead.

The stupid motorway thing isn't uncommon, I have a Garmin unit that does it frequently! My father-in-laws Megane's built-in Tomtom does this also.

What you get with the radionav is all the other features, phone, media player, radio, DNA parameters, as well as the Nav. The fact it's built-in is really nice I think.

 

[bluehandle]

I went for all the options apart from Electric seats, (although I went for heated), Electric mirrors and cool glove box. Be aware, you actually can't have ALL the available options, as there are only a certain amount of slots on the ordering system - most of which are taken up by the base car, colour, engine etc. That's why I dropped the last 2 options.

Regarding the sat nav, I went for it. True, it's not as comprehensive as TomTom, but lets face it, nothing is. The only 2 things I really miss though are the traffic updates (there are updates on the Alfa system, but not as good) and the POI's, which I used to add to on tomtom. Not having the full post code search is not a show stopper for anyone if you are being realistic. If you have the street name, it'll get you there perfectly well. Probably takes an extra 30 seconds to set the destination.

The big advantage of going for the satnav is you can navigate the music, radio, settings, phone and the G force sensor of course, through the big screen rather than the dash display.

 

[Tirreni]

The tomtom allows you manage your media, phone calls through it as well (& has a touch screen), plus it replicates the various trip meters a la radionav. It doesn't show the turbo gauge or power graph when in D ( but he turbo gauge shows on he dash display) nor has the G meter, which to be honest isn't worth the extra price of he radionav in my view

 

[micsanderson]

@bluehandle, when you're making potentially 5 / 6 different trips a day in different cities and people tend to send post codes because it's what the rest of the world conforms to, it really can be a pain. I'm the extreme though, not many people are going to do that so for most it won't really matter.
Also, the street name can matter quite a lot because there are times a street name can start in one town according to the sat nav and finish in another - a post code is just more accurate (if you enter a post code you do it and you're done -- if you enter a street name you first enter the town, then try and find the street, then discover it doesn't want that town it wants the region of the town, or not the town but the city and have to go back to square one) - I know other people have had similar issues and now have, like me, an app on the phone which converts post code to long and lat - problem solved. The thing that annoys me is that the 7 digit post codes are in the maps, but the software will only allow you to enter 5.

Mic

 

[djarte]

In terms of Blue&Me, as it's new, you won't need the extender to work with your iphone. It's only cars of a certain age that do. Mine's a 2011 (December) and doesn't need it so yours shouldn't.

The sat nav will interrupt any other media playing (including iphone) and give instructions and then bring music back. As a preference, i have my satnav permenantly muted, and this means that nothing else bothers me.

Occasionally, on a night, i turn the screen off or tell it to fold itself away, and unmute it. That way i can hear voice instructions but don't have to have the screen on for long journeys in the dark.

Thanks for the quick response.

I am not quite sure if i made myself clear on what i want to achieve. I am not interested in connecting the iphone through the blue&me adapter or directly in order to listen music through the speakers. I want to connect it without using any cables (wirelessly) by using bluetooth a2dp communication. Is this possible or should i have to use the usb cable when i am attaching the device to the blue&me system?

Thanks again.