Automobile News

Alpine, the company which is famously known for its car audio equipment has signed agreements with General Motors, BMW, and Mercedes Benz. However, they will be supplying three different types of products to these companies. It all started with the Alpine announcing its collaboration for supplying head units to the globally famous car manufacturers, Mercedes Benz. Their head equipment is now available in all classes of cars produced by Mercedes Benz around the world.

One of the amazing features of the head unit produced for the Mercedes-Benz is the 40GB hard drive. Users can effectively utilize this space to download songs in MP3 format. The songs can be transferred using the SD card reader or you can even connect it with an iPod to a six-disc DVD changer. Indeed the Alpine head unit for Mercedes appears more impressive than many of Alpine’s other high-end commerical products, like the Alpine IVA-W202R in-car entertainment device. Other features of the Mercedes Benz headset include traffic updates with the help of Sirius Satellite Radio, Bluetooth facility, voice recognition for system control and text-to-speech facility. These features ensure safe driving besides adding luxury to the car.

For the general motors, they will be producing the all-new 2010 Buick LaCrosse, 2010 Chevrolet Equinox and 2010 Cadillac SRX. These devices come with a 2GB memory, USB 2.0 for iPod, flash memory connectivity, DVD/CD player and the FM/AM/XM satellite tuner. Their creation, for the BMW, is a massive surprise package. The center stack comes with a resolution of 1280 x 480 pixels and a display of 8.8 inch, which is the largest center stack available in the market. This stack opens and closes on its own, when not in use. The large display enables easy viewing of the maps and thus is safe for the eyes. In short, the Alpine is riding high, despite recession.

Environmentalists would love the fact that there is a growing consciousness among both consumers and the automobile manufactures to address the serious issue of global warming and pollution. Automobile companies nowadays have shifted their focus to invent technologies that will substantially bring down the emission of hazardous gases like CO2. General Motors has come up its fourth edition of its zero emission, hydrogen fuel cell propelled prototype, the HydroGen4, in this spirit.

The mode is based on the Chevrolet Equinox SUV, and symbolises a marked improvement from many previous models Chevy models, like the, say the Chevrolet Nova, which was known for its terrible fuel efficiency. The model is expected to go into production in a large scale, and should have a production run of 100 or so units. Company sources informed that they are setting themselves a deadline to retail hydrogen fuel cell cars by 2015.

The HydroGen4 scores over its predecessor in its ability to start even at sub-zero temperatures, which is quite an achievement considering the many difficulties associated with a fuel cell vehicle. Moreover, you tend to benefit from an increased range from a fill of hydrogen, improved performance, quieter operation and improved durability. Another factor contributing to the appeal of the car is that it is build in a way that you can maintain it in a cost effective and convenient manner.

The initiative taken by General Motors doesn’t mean that hydrogen fuel cell powered vehicles is a ready alternative to conventional fuels. It is far from the truth, and the recent initiative is all but a small step before we can start thinking of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles as a viable solution.

Tags for this article: general motors, gm, green