Picked up a 2013 Nissan Altima S rental from OAK for the day. Has 44k miles on it. Some Pros and Cons: Pros: even the next from lowest S model (in $23k range) comes with push button entry on doors and and trunk and has push button start. Quite the tall-friendly car for drivers. Steering wheel telescopes a lot. Makes for a good driving position to me. Lot of adjustability range in both dr. seat and wheel which helps a lot, but have to get top trim SL to get 8 way adj dr. seat. Don't have an MPG for the day. Can't figure how to reset running MPG avg, but it keeps showing '34.6 MPG' like a running avg for life of the car I guess Well laid out inside, good interior room, large trunk but, it's not all good, and I'm picky CONS: When setting off from stop, there can be a 'groaniness' in engine and drivetrain at low speeds. It's a CVT and it works hard to keep the RPMS low. It just doesn't sound good under low speed acceleration Handling and ride quality on mild curvy roads definitely doesn't blow me away. Doesn't feel real solid and planted going through curves to me, more like just ok. Wonder if it's had a hard rental life. Interior noise is ok on highway, but it's not luxury quiet Visor is a joke when put to the side. Maybe blocks front half of side window. Is Honda the only one that has visor slide out on rod to block the sun?? Rear seat foam is a bit mushy. Trunk floor piece seems bit thin and cheap. Rear seat headroom is a little bit lacking as well as rear seat view out windows. Don't think Nissan reliability is a high as Honda and certainly not Toyota, esp. according to Consumer Reports Bottom line: It's an alright car, probably worth the money, but I wouldn't buy one.
I took a drive down a local backroad named Palomares road today in this Altima S. I can see why journalists and car aficionados long for manual transmissions on roads like that. The Altima seemed to be grumbling its way up, down and around those windy turns. Hardly what I'd call fun. I agree with Edmunds here - "And that CVT is key to the Altima's miserliness. One of its fuel-saving tricks is its constant attempts to drop the revs as low as possible as soon as possible, to the point that it often feels like it's lugging the engine. .... " 2013 Honda Accord vs. 2014 Mazda 6 vs. 2013 Nissan Altima Sedan Comparison Test | Edmunds.com Good highway cruiser like Autoguide said, but overall, I was underwhelmed by the Altima sedan.
Nissans w/trip computers typically have 2 buttons. 1 of them cycles thru the screens and the other (sometimes on the right) will reset that indicator, if you push and hold. This is the way it is on my '13 Leaf and my mom's 07 NAH (which is about 1.5 generations behind now). My former 02 Maxima and 04 350Z was like the above but the placement and layout of the trip computer buttons was different. I just found this video: .
