Just rented a Prius

I rented a #1 for 2 weeks from Enterprise. I was able to see how it was like during a normal commute and a trip in the mountains with my wife and parents. I ended up getting a #6, which had a lot more gizmos to learn about. As for the controls, some are duplicated on the steering wheel. If you don't like the real time display you can have the map, or turn the display off.

Certainly it takes getting used to, but that would be the same with any new car. I was used to a 1990 Ford Probe, so it was a new, and enjoyable, experience for me.

Hope you enjoy your driving!

 

Very smart to rent first, I didn't but I was able to take a nice, fairly long, test drive and fortunately I really like the car dispite it's few faults.

as aaf709 said you can still operate the HVAC, defrosters, radio, etc. from the steering wheel and front panel radio controls if the MFD goes out. Of course you won't be able to tell the temprature setting or know what frequency the radio is tuned to but those are minor thngs. You can still get down the road with everything working until you get it fixed.

I think the manual is more important for this car than any other I've owned, I've read it cover to cover and still refer back to it quite a bit.

Be sure to let us know if you decide to buy a Prius or not, and why.

 

I have the "premium" one and, even though I'm not much of an audiophile, I feel it lacks bass. You can add a subwoofer which helps.

One the other hand, I like having the 6-CD input and can use the cassette player (with and adapter) for playing MP3s. The 2006 will remove that need, but I can "make do."

 

I called every dealer here in Oklahoma City about renting a Prius for a "Test" No one had any idea about renting one, Zero TRAC dealers. They all said "if we had one to rent, we wouldn't , we would sell it because of the demand". Kudos for even finding one to rent.

<_<

 

We rented a Prius for a week from Enterprise (apparantly, they have a pretty decent sized fleet of them here in CT) before purchasing ours. I recommend it highly for anyone who is considering the car. For us, the car sold itself.

 

Bulls**t. Any Toyota dealer can use a TRAC as a rental/demo for three months (minimum) and THEN sell it for MSRP. That's how I got my '04.

 

OK who did you kill and where are the bodies barred . I have tried 4 times to get a Prius while traveling and I have been told none are available. How do you get one in a distant city.

 

That's nice. Are they selling it at MSRP, or is there a discount?

 

Like most posters have pointed out, you can control *most* of your climate control functionality thru the steering wheel. However, if you're the kind of guy who likes a constant airflow, and don't necessarily want the climate control directing where the air goes, then you are SOL and will have to use the MFMFD to control the air flow. A well thought out design it ain't.

 

If you really don't like the real-time mpg/engine display, you can turn off the display so it's just an unlit black screen. It will turn on automatically when you select any of the auxillary screens like Climate and Audio and then turn back off when those screens are dismissed.

I think the Display Off button is somewhere off of the main Info screen.

 

One thing that struck me about this was when I took a church member home. He's blind, so he wasn't interested in the color or the general look. He paid more attention to the sounds of the car, such as the NAV system.

What relates here is if you're a blind passenger, what can you control if you want to? In most cars you can learn by feel where the A/C control is, or where the radio buttons are. In the Prius, you have to rely on the driver more to control things like the radio and climate.

 

That is one thing car designers do look at when designing controls in cars (not necessarily for use by the blind, but I digress). You'll typically find that the radio controls are placed where they're easily visible and within reach (typically angled towards the driver) because studies show that drivers like to see station info (more important now with the spread of RDS) and they like to change stations often. Climate controls are placed within reach, but usually slightly below the radio since they're not used as often. You will find that the knobs on climate systems usually vary in size, so while you're driving you can change settings by feel.

Back when automatic climate control systems were coming into vogue, it was typical to have them computerized to death, and have everything accessed with a ton of little buttons (sort of like the Prius). GM did a study, which is fairly well known in design circles, which showed that the best design for an automatic climate control system was... a dial with temperatures, like most people have at home. You want to go from cold to hot, just turn.

Toyota had the right idea with the original Prius, but they sort of regressed with second generation.

 

I have to admit that when I first got in a Prius for a test drive, I thought that the MFD was too distracting as well, and was asking the sales person how to turn it off. By the end of the test drive I was used to everything, and by that point the MFD was extra entertainment.

And the MFD provides a really good tool on an on-going basis for tuning the way that I drive, in terms of maximizing mpg. It also helps to tune you in with the operation of the car, and I feel that if something goes wrong I'll know it pretty quick that way.

-Roger

 

Yeah, I'm not happy with that myself. If the power is out the only way to open it is by crawling into the rear area and popping something. Ah well. At least it's easy to put something in there. My last car was also a hatchback, but there was a lip.