New review on CNET, 12/11/07
 

http://reviews.cnet.com/coupe-hatchb...ml?tag=nl.e729

Overall, pretty fair, I'd say…

"If there is any justification for Mazda's claim to being the brand of "zoom zoom" driving, it is the RX-8 coupe. With its tiny rotary engine, chiseled exterior profile, and racing heritage, the RX-8 is an attractive and individual package that competes with cars above its price range. "

decent review.....but they could have done a lot better with the 0 - 60 times.

"Its cabin tech is badly outdated." Yea, I guess if you are comparing it to an Audi or a BMW. I personally love the interior of the 8 and believe it to be a very unique style.

Oh.....and VR rules!

....decent??...more like in-decent. It is as far from a creditable car review as Dunkin dounuts is from good coffee. More accurately, it might be called a geek squad review! Kevin Massy I imagine is a 20 something fellow consumed with ipods, music at every turn in his daily life, checking out each test car's drop the clutch/hold the brakes 0-60 time, and being cool over an energy drink as he has read a book to understand how a rotary engined car works (sort of).

"handling" is used precisely 2 times in his written review. He's far more interested (and disturbed) by 'lack of entertainment options', the menu structure of navigating same, as well as the many 'Masonic' shapes in the car.

I'd be interested to know how many miles total the car 'review' encompased, because he barely notes anything other than a couple simplistic comments about comfy ride and sharp handling.

He should have stopped at the 'PRODUCT SUMMARY'. Less words is more in this reviewer's case.

Well, any review on CNET—no matter what it's for—is as seen thru the eyes of a tech geek or, at the very least, people who really love gadgets. That's reasonable; I'm sure most of the people who visit CNET place an unusually high priority on tech. So I think it's understandable and fair that he was critical of the 8's lack of state-of-the-art gadgetry, because that's his audience. Those of us who don't live and die on how integrated our iPod is don't care as much. (In the same way, I believe his comments about the "cabin being outdated" refer just to tech & gadgetry. He wasn't talking about style, comfort, or appearance.)

So I still think the review was pretty fair—and, except for the tech stuff—I got the feeling he really liked the car.

What surprises me with the review is that they actually did a somewhat thorough 0-60 launch test with varying revs, though the ground was slightly damp.

Some errors in that article:
The models after the '05s supposedly lost some actual power (we know that's just the standards changing)

- Touch-screen nav that can control the audio and AC?? I have an '07 GT with the nav. and was under the assumption it wasn't a touch-screen (you bet I'll be digging for this info after this post)

I watch these CNET car reviews on CNET TV, and they are horrid- the guy is not knowledgeable and he approaches each car as if it were an appliance. I never knew why CNET got into this- either you're in it, or you're not. It's a poorly done sideline for them

From the CNET review: "We managed just more than 220 miles on a full 16-gallon tank of gas, translating to a meager 14 mpg, nearly half of which was in highway driving."

OK... something is up when car reviewers don't know how to calculate mileage. These guys actually calculated MPG from the capacity of the tank... not the amount of fuel they added? Even if they're tech geeks, you'd think they could use the calculator utility on their iPhone to run the numbers. I'm guessing they probably consumed and had to add less than 13 gallons to the tank. Still not stellar MPG, but not as aweful as they want you to think.

good point! Also, I don't think they used the last two gears on the freeway and were probably driving at cruising speeds in the 6k-7k rpm range lol
I can get 20+ gas mileage (mixed driving) if I drove mine like a piston engine.

Guess what? Some RX8's actually get terrible mileage. Some are even worse than 14mpg. I'd bet that their calculations were just fine. I can't believe you haven't seen people around here complaining about it.

Mine was that way. 14 mpg. They're being reasonable.

15.6 Mostly highway, woo!

I wasn't trying to open up a whole mpg discussion here... as others have pointed out, it's been discussed ad nauseum in other threads. I was just pointing out that for whatever reason, their analytical skills are not up to par.

And for those who suggested that their calculations were probably fine, yes, they did correctly divide two numbers to get an answer... but one of those two numbers did not represent the amount of fuel used. They divided the number of miles (220) they went before refueling by the total capacity of the tank (16 gal.) (you can check the math-- 220/16= rounds up to approx 14). I seriously doubt that they drove the car until it was out of gas.... so, they ignore the fact that there were probably at least 2 gallons of fuel left in the tank/fuel lines/pump/etc. that they had not consumed. (I'd guess, they could start the car and drive another 40 miles before it would stop runnning for lack of fuel, and even at that point there would still be some fuel in the tank that the pump couldn't pick up).

Absent a more sophisticated fuel metering system, they could at least have used the amount of fuel they added to calculate the mileage. The fact is, that if they only added 13 gallons on refueling, 220/13= appprox 17 mpg. Still not great mileage, but easily within the new EPA estimates (16/22).

My point is that in terms of automotive journalism, their methods are suspect. Either because they wanted to harp on bad fuel economy, so they purposely used an inaccurate, but, apparently believable computation (really shady)... or because they simply don't know which numbers to run (not so shady, but questionable tech ability). I believe there are likely some 8's out there that return 14 mpg... but the one they tested is not one of those.

You have no idea what their methods are. Why bother making this argument?

You're right... I have no idea what goes on behind closed doors at CNET. But, based on what they did put in the article, I suspect their methods may include arithmetic, probably division.

"We managed just more than 220 miles on a full 16-gallon tank of gas, translating to a meager 14 mpg, nearly half of which was in highway driving."

Well, the guys is right about the cabin being not that interesting. There are no "gadgets" with the GT model. It's a 2008 model and it doesn't offer Bluetooth or input for MP3 devices....AND the CD player doesn't play MP3s.

Come on Mazda. This is supposed to be your flag ship sports car and even my friend's Camry offer these things.

The Rx8 is a great car to drive, but if you're into gadgets, better be a DIY guy who can add all those bells and whistles yourself.

BTW, I get 14-15mpg.

:eyetwitch

(the current model's 1.3-liter Renesis twin rotor engine delivers less horsepower than its '05 predecessor) :squint:


According to Mazda, the navigation system's touch screen can also be used to program the car's climate control and audio systems. In the absence of the navigation system, however, we were reduced to using the RX-8's head unit controls to program our music selection. :squint:

"...we got out our performance computer and found a long, straight piece of road."

I stopped reading after ^.

I get 15-16 mpg with a turbo and a heavy foot. No one believes me when I tell them though. "in that little car?"

The bottom line here, is, if you purport to...

1) be a car reviewer
2) be a (descriptive and accurate) professional writer for cnet
3) have some math/common sense ability (as any techie by definition should)

And then you go about documenting the facts showing you don't have 1), 2), or 3) by putting a written car view on the internet such as his, you're pretty much deserve, and asking for, what you get in the form of critique in the public forum...esp. from those who CAN write, or who CAN do basic grade school math, or HAVE a modicum of common sense...:rant:

Why do people try to launch this car like a piston driven car? Its a rotary, rev her high and let her rip! They needed to add 2500-3000 more rpms to get a healthy launch to net high 5 or low 6 sub second 0-60 times.

All the rides i had wether it was my Mustang, 300Z TT, Maxima , 2800-3500 rpms was always the sweet spot and sometimes a little bit over kill to get a good launch. Getting to know my Rx-8 and trying to launch at 3500rpm is a joke! In my case , 5800-6000 rpms with the traction control turned off will get you out the hole very quickly! But thats the sweet spot for my Rx-8, also running 19" with 275 meats on the back helps me hook up rather nicely!:)

Of course it involved division. However, it's easy to accurately measure gas mileage without running out of gas. Technically it would be the most accurate to run it out of gas to get your numbers, then fill up with a spare tank. That's quite a pain for the small amount of accuracy gained over my method. It's easy to get a reasonably accurate result like this:

-Reset the trip odometer when filling up at the gas station and fill the tank.

-Drive the car until it is almost empty. The emptier the better.

-Fill up with gas at the same gas station and the same pump (Just to make sure the cutoff of the pump is the same).

-The amount of gallons displayed on the second fill up is how many gallons you used during the trial (conveniently displayed to the second or third decimal place), and the miles you traveled during the trial is your trip odometer. Divide the number of gallons on the pump by the trip odometer, and you have a pretty accurate reading.

-Flip off the guy honking behind you at the pump.:lol:

I agree the article is poorly written, but don't assume their math is bad too.You may be absolutely correct, but there's no way to know. They mentioned they made it 220 miles during their trial, and this is a more useful number to casual readers since they don't run their tank until it's fully empty.

They had an older review where I think the car came in a 6 something. Cnet is absulutely horrid at reviewing most things in general. They're very quick to burn through products and come to their conclusions just as quick. I believe one of the things the other review continued to moan about was lack of bluetooth... when in the history of driving was this a big deal? and on sport cars?

If there is one other thing I will say, it's that their staff is horribly inconsistent in the way they review products. 2 very similar products (a laptop for example) can get two very different reviews...

Yeah, i don't get hat there saying there. I love it as well! For a sports car at that price its nicely equipped, especially compared to a 350z's cheap interior

At least it was reviewed. Reviews are farther and farther between since it is a 2004 model.

I don't think cabin looks dated, but the technology is moving forward. But the 350Z and S2000 aren't any better--were they expecting an LS460?