dazed

Yep, sounds about right for an IS250 - surprisingly good for a 2.5 V6 automatic. There's a thread over on the NX forum where the (slightly disgruntled) consensus seems to have the average NX mpg somewhere around 33mpg. Makes a mockery of the declared CO2 emissions.

Updating the maps doesn't change the underlying capabilities

Linas - from what you've written I'm surprised you didn't go straight to the RC200t for your test drive. You sound a bit like me - the type of guy who's yet to won over by this whole hybrid malarkey. Any chance of you begging another test drive and giving us a write up of the RC200t in your own inimitable style?

Full postcode entry arrived sometime around 2009-2010 (facelift?) (probably the same time that the Bluetooth A2DP profile was added). Someone else may be able to provide a more precise answer, but if it's important to you I'd recommend checking before you buy.

The Advance is rather more than just an SE. It would be better described as somewhere between an SE-I and SE-L. Compared to the SE, the only thing it lacked was ventilated seats (it kept the heated seats). In addition it gained the infotainment pack (sat nav + Bluetooth, including full postcode lookup and the A2DP profile for music streaming from a phone). Several other features were also added including DLRs (as you said), headlight washers, automatic wipers, auto dimming rear view mirror and high gloss interior trim. Wheels were also 18 inch (well mine are and they were standard in 2012). So all in all, not a bad spec and certainly a step up from SE.

If you love the car and have no wish to see the back of it I'd spend the money without hesitation. If on the other hand you're getting itchy feet or think you will in the near future then I'd take the opportunity to trade it in. Just my 2 cents worth

Really? I test drove an IS300h around Cambridge for a couple of hours and got just under 40mpg (which I thought was actually rather good bearing in mind my IS250 would struggle to hit 25mpg). I'd reckon mid 30s - tops, falling back towards 30mpg after a prolonged period.

As I understand it, the auto gearbox in the IS250 would not be suitable for mating with the diesel engine (too much torque I presume) and Lexus presumably didn't think it was worth the time and effort to source/develop a gearbox for a car that was pitched squarely at the fleet market where low CO2 is king.

The "manual gear selection" is really just a gear limiter. If for example you select 4th then the car will never select 5th or 6th - but it won't go into 4th until it's good and ready to. Basically, the feature allows you to hold onto lower gears for longer during acceleration or get some gearbox braking when slowing down. Personally I never use it and I suspect most owners don't either.

OK. I'll concede that many others are probably just as bad, if not worse. My experience of other comparable cars is limited - the nearest is probably a Honda Accord, but that was running on 16 inch alloys so perhaps not a fair comparison. I think the point I was trying to make was how critical picking the right tyres is on the IS. I've never driven a car before where the choice of the tyre makes such a significant difference to the amount of road noise that is heard in the cabin. Maybe this is partly to do with the quiet engine and low level of wind noise, so the tyre noise becomes more significant. I've currently got some Michelins on the front - noisy as hell, but Toyos on the back, which are noticeably quieter.

What's not to like: Flaky alloys (although to be fair the wheels on my current 2012 model are holding up well, unlike previous cars). Road noise. Some tyres are better than others in mitigating this, but compared to other cars I drive, the IS is quite noisy. Soft paint work. Probably a criticism that can be levelled at most cars nowadays. A few more rattles than I would expect from a premium brand car. High cost of some parts (e.g. exhaust). That's about it really. Supremely reliable engine and sublime gearbox Definitely the best car I've ever owned - and I've had several ISes (all petrol) since 2006. Never had any expenses other than routine servicing, tyres and windscreens in over 200K miles. Goodness knows what I'm going to do in a few years time when my current one reaches the end of its useful life (to me). My dislike of hybrids means I'll probably be forced to move on from Lexus.

Lexus charge about £200 (inclusive) parts and labour to change the spark plugs.

Careful Kris or it'll end up looking like a taxi. But congratulations on being different and going for a Lexus.

Sometimes, but I spend most of time writing realtime software nowadays. So much stuff that used to require proprietary hardware can now be done in software using cheap commodity hardware.

Definitely. For 20 euros they gave me lifetime updates and traffic updates (internet connection required) for the whole of Europe. Maps can be downloaded, so no internet connection required (unlike Google) - although you have to sacrifice the live traffic updates if no internet is available. Great for misers like me who refuse to enable data roaming when abroad! The IS satnav is OK, but is showing its age (I'm guessing the tech is 15 years old now - maybe older). I used to work for a chip company supplying chips to car manufacturers (amongst others). They always took the oldest (i.e. most stable) devices they could lay their hands on - they weren't interested in bleeding edge technology (like the mobile phone makers) since footprint and power consumption weren't an issue to them. And those decisions were taken about three years before the car was even launched!

Yep. More déjà vu than au revoir I fear.

I've ordered those parts in the past from my local dealer without any problem. Ridiculously expensive though. The last time I needed a new windscreen, the guy came with replacement clips and trim which was great as it saved me having to buy them myself at extra expense.

Assuming you don't already have one, order the relevant touch up stick from your local dealer - about £10 if my memory serves me right. They come with full (pictorial style) instructions which even I managed to figure out after a couple of minutes.

From "suspiciously cheap" to "practically worthless". Which is it to be? Sure it's overpriced - but what car isn't when it's on the forecourt. But worthless? As long as it's got a full service history, a recent MOT and is in reasonable condition my guess is it's probably worth at least £4K (assuming 130K miles). With such high mileage there's probably little to no market data on its true value. It's effectively worth whatever a buyer is prepared to pay for it.

You are indeed correct Normski.

I live out in "the sticks", drive about 25K miles a year and have covered over 150K miles in IS250 second generation cars. I've encountered numerous potholes over the years and received some real whacks from them (including 2 cracked rims) - and I mean real whacks - toothache, ringing ears etc. In all that time I've never seen any sign of damage to the car itself. So I'm sceptical. After nearly a decade I would have expected such a problem to have been big news on a forum like this long ago.

Being an automatic, your car doesn't have a clutch. What it does have is a torque converter. It is possible to damage a torque converter which can result in symptoms similar to a slipping clutch, but it's very unusual and you would probably have heard something when the damage/failure occurred. How free revving is the engine when you're driving? For example if you press the throttle down reasonably swiftly, do the revs fly up and stay there while very little power is transmitted to the wheels even after two or three seconds? Does the car drop down a gear or two as per usual or is it more likely to stay in a higher gear since the problem began? How well does the car coast? If there is brake resistance of any kind you'll lose speed more rapidly than usual when you throttle off.

Those figures sound about right. Compared with many cars the IS250 actually does live up to the published figures. See http://www.honestjohn.co.uk/realmpg/lexus/is-2005/250

I think you'd be lucky to get 29MPG around town in an IS250 - 25 would probably be a more realistic target. Of course, the driving experience would be in a different league with the automatic transmission and the refined petrol engine.

Totally agree. Lexus could do with using a different "chime" for warnings (as opposed to full on errors) - something with a slightly less aggressive attack transient. The current one is enough to make me jump out of my skin - not good when I'm concentrating on driving. I think Lexus have also changed the frequency of warnings on more recent cars. Although I rarely encounter the warning (I top the bottle up regularly) it used to only warn me once (or perhaps twice) on a journey in my 57 plate car, but now in my 12 plate it's chiming away every few miles and more-or-less permanently hi-jacking the information display area for itself. It would be far better if it warned just warn once when the condition occurred and then subsequently when the car was shifted in or out of Park.