agalbraith

If you peel up the carpet in the boot, there is a small laptop-style DVD drive towards the right hand side of the spare wheel. They go in there ;)

<laugh> Cheers, Merry Christmas! :hohoho:

I picked up my new IS300 yesterday morning. I think I can emphatically support the "Go with the IS300" argument. It's just fabulous. :D :P :D

I've used them twice. First time, I needed to borrow a France sat-nav CD. They were fantastic, sent me the CD, didn't charge me anything, all it cost me was the postage to return it. Utterly fabulous - the BMW and Merc drivers in the office were stunned :D Second time, I was having problems with a rusty bonnet. I bought the car used (albeit as Lexus sucession) from Derby, and the dealers didn't seem to want to know. It took a lot of bitching and letter writing to get it sorted - and Customer Care didn't seem to want to do anything other than refer me back to the dealer (who wasn't being helpful at the time). I'm still very impressed that Lexus have a customer care centre. Now, if only Volvo had the same service, I may never have switched to Lexus to start with....

I did drive one while looking to replace my current IS. They are a lot better built that the "old" 9-3, and have loads of fab buttons to play with. The only shame was that it was UTTERLY boring to drive. I did only try the 2.0t though, the Aero may be marginally more exciting. Either way, not up to a Lexus....

I get around 330-350 miles between full and fuel light on my IS200 Auto. I reckon that's around 28mpg, is a fair mix of motorway and town - though I do tend to drive "somewhat aggresively" :P If it's just round town, this will drop to 260 miles, which is around 22mpg I don't think I ever switch the air conditioner off, but I'm sceptical that this makes a significant difference.

Car insurance, along with the cursed speed camera on 50+ roads, is my main bitch when people mention cars. However, where you live is going to be a big factor here.... annoyingly, the insurance companies rob you blind if: - You don't live in the middle of a field - You are forced to use your garage as storage - You drive a nice car, and aren't over 92 I'm not entirely sure how the formula works - but I'm looking at renewing my current Direct Line policy with a new IS300 (worth about 15 grand more than my current IS200) and it only works out at about 70 quid more. I'm 25 now, bought the current IS at 23, and I've always been paying around the 700-800 mark for insurance. So it strikes me that you are being mugged for 2300, Playa. I was "only" paying 1200 for fully comp on a brand new Volvo T4 when I was 21... with 1yr no claims. I think I got that with Bell Direct... There's a vicious rumour that bargainously cheap "Gold Members" insurance is imminent tho ;)

Hi Freehand, Assuming that everything behaves in the standard Toyota/Lexus way: CRUISE CONTROL - CRUISE ON/OFF This turns the master cruise control on or off. If you are currently "cruising" this will disengage cruise control. The master control must be on before any of the other buttons do anything. - SET/COAST Once you've turned the master control on, selecting 'Set/Coast' will start the automatic speed hold. The car will now attempt to maintain the speed you were at when you pressed 'Set/Coast'. If the car is already holding speed for you, then tapping the 'Set/Coast' button will reduce your speed by 1mph. Holding it will continue reducing your speed until you release the button. Your speed will then hold at the new setting. - CANCEL If the car is automatically holding your speed, this will temporarily cancel the feature. You can perform the same function by tapping the brake pedal. - RES/ACC This is the "resume" button. If you were previously holding a speed, but have not turned off the engine or turned off the master "On/Off" feature, pushing this button will resume your old speed. E.g. if you were on the motorway at 70mph, pressed the brake, then wish to carry back on at 70mph, simply press "Res/Acc" and the car will pick up speed and hold 70 mph again. If you tap this button whilst cruise is active, you will accelerate by 1mph. If you hold it down, you'll continue to accelerate until you release the button, and the car will hold the new speed. NOTES ON CRUISE - Cruise automatically disengages if your speed drops below 25mph (ish). - You cannot hold a speed lower than 25mph. - My car has a pretty "Cruise" light that follows the master switch. It's totally unrelated to whether or not cruise is actually active. TRANSMISSION Your car is a little more exciting than mine... but the ECT-S PWR button is basically Sport mode on the transmission. I can't help with your other questions I'm afraid....

Selfish of me, I know - but are we sure that there are no nice "Lexi" on the bottom of the channel now? I know that there's another lexus delivery due in this week, on the 17th IIRC.... I don't think I can cope with the disappointment of another slipped delivery.... Terrible shame for all those BMW buyers, obviously - hopefully they'll see the light....

Eugh.... so something nice and simple then I'm by no means a graphics designer, but have been playing with Photoshop for a while now. I'd be happy to try and help you out. However, the pain here (or for me, anyway) is two fold: - You need decent pictures of the things you're trying to alter and impose (e.g current car, new wheels) - The perspective between the two images needs to be similar (a low shot of new wheels, v.s. a high shot of current car is a complete pain to manipulate) - If you're going for website size pics (72dpi) they'll look reasonable. However, you'll never fool professional print (unless you're a pro... see caveat [a]!) But hey, it's worth a try :D A

What's up - can you give more of a clue as to your issue ? :P

I was trying to sort out a 24 drive recently too. A terrifying figure of several thousand seems to apply unless: - The dealer is not being cheap - You pay a 10 quid fee - You arrange your own comprehensive insurance I've been charged a tenner on courtesy cars before too... although I've never gone back for a second service ;) I think if you pay the fee, it drops to the 200 quid Ian mentioned. A

Hi, I've been reading through some of the older forum posts, as a "newbie", and there are several references to "programmable options" - either for general car features, or the satnav. I know that some manufacturers / dealers can change the way individual cars behave (a friend just had his Saab convertible reprogrammed to automatically lock as he pulls away, and the annoying "seatbelts" chime disabled) and I was wondering what, if any, options can be set on the IS200/300? Of particular interest to me, would be: GENERAL ======= - Automatic locking of doors when moving away - Option to only unlock the drivers door on the first press of the remote SATNAV ===== - Disable the infuriating "lockout" when exceeding 5 mph - Disable the dimming backlight in "day" mode with headlights on (if its raining hard, but the sun is in your eyes, you CANNOT read that screen!) I have a 99 IS200 SE/Auto/Nav currently, but hope to pick up my new IS300/Nav on Friday... so would be interested in what I *could* have changed, and what I can now get changed ;) Cheers, Alistair

...sadly, the black one went to the dealer who had it on hold. But.... there's a nice blue one at the centre in Bristol, with my name on it :D Reading are telling me that it'll take two weeks or so to get this to me though.... does it really take that long? There must be a way to speed that up....

Anything up to eight weeks. However, when I placed the order late on Thursday night, there was an Astral Black IS300 / Nav sat in the import centre, but another dealer had a "hold" on it. Reading were hoping to acquire that car when the "hold" expired at 23:59 on Friday - in which case it could be a matter of days..... The guy I'm dealing with is out until after lunch today... and the suspense is killing me

I've had an IS200 (SE/Auto Nav) for a couple of years now, and have looked at seemingly EVERYTHING trying to find a replacement. Having tried the likes of BMW, Audi, Volvo, Merc, Porsche.... I concluded that I love the IS200.... ... but then I tried the IS300 :) I agree with bigsul though... I don't expect the fuel consumption to be too upsetting (going by the book, should use around 10% more fuel) but what you don't know can't hurt you. I'm waiting for the nice people at Lexus reading to confirm the delivery date of my IS300 today :D