Rabbers

There can be little doubt that the presence of insects is a flattering tribute to the attractiveness of the 300h's cockpit design. Evidence for this lies in the reluctance of flies, mosquitoes, midges etc., to leave the car even when you open all the windows and doors for the purpose. In fact, this usually acts as invitation for others to come in. With specific regard to spiders, some people regard them as bringers of good luck - or the opposite if you kill them. Being superstitious, I try to flick them out of the car with a finger, not always successfully.

I agree that the alarm might well have been set off by some kind of insect. I was once woken up in the middle of the night by a hotel porter when the alarm of my 250 sounded for no apparent reason and woke up the entire neighborhood. Next morning I found a dead wasp on my seat.

Which begs the question of whether the paddles are in any way useful. While their use can enable you to obtain lag-free quick acceleration by keeping the power up, you can get the same practical result by momentarily switching to Sport mode from Normal or Eco.

This week marks our first anniversary, and I have to say that I love my 300h more each day. Looking back, quarrels have been rare except for when, without explanation, she would sometimes refuse to connect to my iPhone, or suddenly cut me off in mid- conversation. From time to time she would also freeze my iPod and memory sticks, but this was because she needed time to digest the contents before delivering them with fidelity and impressive power, sometimes accompanied by album art and other times not. Now that I have learned to be patient with her and push the right buttons, she is reliable and fairly predictable, although her frequent mis-hearing of vocal commands indicates a congenital defect which, if left untreated, she might pass on to future generations. Her navigational skills are occasionally questionable but, when she promptly supplies alternative choices, easy to forgive. When asked to move, she does so with poise and feline grace, stealthily and silently, gathering pace fluidly and without apparent effort, her body so smooth and firm as to make the weekly application of foams and cosmetic potions an addictive delight. Indeed, like all thoroughbred beauties, she insists on cleanliness and dreads the slightest blemish, inside and out. When in motion, she does not drone but almost imperceptibly purrs, and her whine upon stopping, which some have unkindly but not altogether unjustly likened to that of a milk-float, is neither offensive nor annoying and, on acquaintance, becomes quite pleasing. In an overcrowded and noisy world pervaded by noxious fumes, she enfolds you in her protective embrace and calms your fevered brow. Her multiple charms do not come cheap, but you soon understand that her taste for champagne can be satisfied for the cost of beer, since, like the well-bred lady she is, she demurely sips and never gulps. Not unexpectedly, her lithe elegance and hint of oriental mystery inspire admiration and curiosity, and perhaps a little envy, especially among those accustomed to weightier and brasher teutonic curves, but her response is neither haughty nor ill-mannered. Rather, she reveals herself as being pleased to be different.

The aim of 700miles (=1126km) on a single tank is realistic provided that a certain amount of self-inflicted irritation and temporary loss of driving pleasure are not issues. Once, and only once, I managed 979km (=608miles) with 55.9 litres (=12.3 gallons), this being the amount of petrol consumed between a full-to-the-brim tank start and the appearance of the low-fuel warning. Arithmetic tells me that at this rate of consumption I would have got to 1158km (=720miles) before running dry about 10 litres (=2.2 gallons) later. I am not planning to repeat this experience because: (a) the effort in terms of self-discipline is frankly not worth it; (b) I am sensitive to rude gestures from other road users who want to go faster or overtake, and © I obviously (and shamefully) misled those same road users into thinking that the 300h is a slow car. In other words, having come from a second-generation IS250, I proved to my own satisfaction that the 300h can be an amazingly economic car to drive. Generally speaking, I now fill up when the low-fuel warning comes on every 870-920km (=540-570 miles) or so, with maybe 170km (=100 miles+) to spare, and I really no longer think too much about transmission modes or the occasionally excessive weight of my right foot.

When I first had my 300h, I got into the habit of routinely driving in ECO mode, reasoning that I was being ecologically virtuous while saving myself a bit of fuel on account of the gentler acceleration response. And since the car restarts in the mode in which it was left, I must have made many trips in ECO without noticing the fact or, indeed, caring about it except for times when I needed to use SPORT mode. On a whim, I decided to try driving in NORMAL for a few tankfuls in order to see if there was any difference in overall consumption, and came to the conclusion that it was either non-existent or so small as to be barely measurable. Certainly, it was not sufficient to make me revert to ECO and thus sacrifice the car's slightly but noticeably perkier performance in NORMAL, which is the mode I now favour except in situations that require frequent stops and starts. When cruise control is engaged, I reckon levels of fuel consumption to be exactly the same whatever the mode, including SPORT. In summary, I think that the economic usefulness of ECO mode depends on one's personal ability, when accelerating away from a stop or low speed, to dose the weight of the right foot so as not to neutralize the benefit of the toned-down pedal response. Personally, I have not yet got the knack of it and perhaps I never will.

Jami: 260kmh in the present-generation 250 is amazing. In the previous-generation 250, of which I have owned two, and which, if I remember right, also had a declared top speed of 225kmh (=140mph), I never got near this figure even on the most welcoming stretches of autobahn. I fully understand your reluctance to push a car that is not your own to its limits but, as I said in my post, the 300h showed no strain at its declared limit of 200kmh and beyond, the way to get to it being to gently but firmly accelerate until the pedal is almost floored and then finally floor it upon the needle's first signs of hesitation around the high 180s/low 190s. As regards the 300h's ability to brake from high speeds, I had been a little concerned after one leading Italian motor magazine (Quattroruote, October 2013) declared the braking distance to a stop from 160kmh, which is the cruising speed I generally aim for on the autobahn, to be 113m with a light load, while another (Auto, August 2013), without specifying the load, said 101m, which is a more comforting figure but still worse than the average for the class. However, whether my own personal reaction times were good or average or poor when the need occurred to brake to a standstill or near-standstill from cruising speeds because of incidents or queues ahead, I objectively judged my distances on 18" Turanzas, 225/40+rear255/35, with 17000km wear on them, to be no worse and possibly better than those of most of the cars I encountered behind and ahead of me. Stability of line, on the other hand, I found to be excellent from even higher speeds, and this gave me a higher degree of confidence, especially in wet conditions, than I ever felt in the 250. As regards steep and winding downhill stretches where there is a genuine need to slow down to, and maintain, the limits of 120kmh or sometimes 100kmh because of the danger from the surprising number of cars that have difficulty in keeping to their own lane (and where I surmise that brake failures are not unknown), I found the roadholding and the speed and precision of the steering response to be beyond reproach, and if the steering itself is said by some critics to lack feel, they are either talking nonsense or I have gotten so accustomed to this "defect", if it exists, that I no longer notice it. I notice you mention low-dust brake pads and the possibility that they might negatively affect deceleration. I have no experience of them, but do you think they are worth fitting if only on cosmetic grounds?

I apologise if this post gives the initial impression of being written by a fan of Top Gear (which I nowadays rarely watch after it became little more than a comedy show). I confess, though, that when I was thinking of buying my 300h, I was worried, having once been a disciple of Clarkson, about the limitation of the speed to 200kmh, this being the minimum figure Lexus thought it could get away with without over- diluting the car's intended sporty image. My concern arose not from practical every- day considerations but from the idea that my very occasional therapeutic need for speed would become no more than a nostalgic memory. I need not have worried. Recently, on a fast, straight and slightly downhill stretch of German autobahn along which I always look forward to driving whenever I get the chance, regrettably only two or three times a year, the 300h nudged 215kmh (maybe a real 205kmh) before the needle stabilised. That I used to touch 220-230kmh (maybe a real 215kmh) in a previous-generation 250 on the same piece of road is less important than the seamlessness and linearity of progression with which the 300h reached its top speed. The 250, by contrast, tended to struggle after the 200kmh mark, almost inviting you to ease off. Although the 300h's performance did not get me to yelp and whoop as members of the Top Gear team and their stooges are wont to do when stamping on the loud pedal of cars few of their audience will ever drive, I was nevertheless deeply impressed by the beautifully engineered marriage between the engine and the CVT, and cannot understand why the latter has been so maligned. I also suspect the 300h got to 200kmh at least as quickly as the 250, and certainly less noisily, but I won't even try to guess the comparative times. Knowing full well that speeds of over 200kmh are in any case silly, being not only uneconomic but also dangerous when maintained for any length of time on a public road, even where there is no speed limit, and having at the same time observed that the 300h's top-end shortfall of 10% in respect of the 250's speed in no way caused the hair on my chest to thin out and wither, my sole ground for disappoint- meant was the increased frequency with which I was flashed by big Germans in the overtaking lane. My consolation was that since they were on their own home turf it would have been rude not to let them pass. Were I a few years younger and living in Germany, though, I would probably be looking at ways and means of financing the purchase of an RC-F....

Unless the higher road tax and fuel bills of a petrol-engined car are compensated by greater driving pleasure in respect of a hybrid equivalent in the same price bracket, as they are clearly considered to be by some contributors to this thread who prefer the 250 to the 300h, the choice of a hybrid is pretty much obligatory for private buyers. Whether this choice is not further influenced by a desire to share the warm and fuzzy feeling that some drivers supposedly get from the thought that they are doing their bit to save the planet is very much a question of personal attitudes, or of degrees of political correctness best kept to oneself. However, if we accept that Victorian cities would have been cleaner and healthier places had it been possible to breed horses that dropped less dung on the streets while eating less hay, it would be illogical not to support and encourage manufacturers who, in our own time, make cars that reduce pollution and make less noise, especially when those cars, like the majority of Lexus ones, are a pleasure to own and drive. I am therefore not at all sure whether we are becoming over-obsessed with fuel economy and being "brainwashed" into buying hybrids, or whether the increasing share of the market of these and other fuel-efficient vehicles is not simply the reflection of economic, environmental and sanitary needs that companies like Toyota/Lexus would have come to acknowledge and act upon even without pressure from regulatory agencies worldwide.

In his post of 17 August, michaelH commented that since some of us surely drive the new IS250, this should be called the "IS Mark 3 Forum". This is a fair point but, strangely, it appears to have received no replies. I was reminded of this post when, earlier this week, I had a long chat with the owner of a French Lexus dealership from whom I gathered that the first-year sales of the new 250 were originally projected at a 1:6 ratio with the 300h. This ratio was expected to vary little from country to country, but has proved unrealistic just about everywhere, some of his colleagues in both France and Germany having sold no 250s at all to date in 2014 while meeting or even exceeding their targets for the 300h. One of the few places where the 250 sells well is said to be Russia, no doubt for good commercial reasons of its own, but this market does not figure in Lexus' European statistics. These results are seen by some as a vindication of the decision of some countries - most notably Italy, Holland and Belgium - to withdraw and not replace the old 250 upon the launch of the 300h, and if the resulting all-hybrid range might have been considered a last-ditch attempt by Lexus to differentiate itself from competitors instead of continuing to unsuccessfully go head-to-head with them, it was never- theless trumpeted as a bold strategic move (which appears to be paying off in view of sales growth well above that of other premium manufacturers in the first half of 2014). With specific regard to the 250, there remains a widespread belief among dealers that an attempt to milk an old product by repackaging it (with a new body and chassis but the same poor fuel consumption) when BMW (3- and 4-series) and Mercedes (C and CLA) were themselves launching new or renewed models in the same segment was never going to be successful, and, what is worse, likely to confuse prospective purchasers of both the 300h and the GS. Thus the new 250 has tended to remain unpromoted everywhere it is sold, and even the prospect of a hefty discount is rarely enough to overcome serious concerns about depreciation even in the eyes of those who care less about fuel economy than a nice ride. Be all this as it may, it is fair to conclude that the chances of spotting a present- generation 250 on the road are pretty low, at least in continental Europe, and it would not be surprising if the market life of this model will be quite short.

"Need to try harder" would be presumptuous given the vision I have of entire teams of Nipponic engineers and designers working to good purpose and in perfect harmony, but "upgrades for the facelift" (or if possible even before the facelift) would certainly not be inappropriate for the boot-hinges.

All the features mentioned add up to exceptional pleasure of ownership, my own favourite being the two-speed window closing. The only irritating design blemish, and a surprising backwards step in respect of the 250, lies in the boot-hinges, sheathed for cosmetic purposes in unpleasantly thin and springy PVC, and with an unfortunate tendency, because of their size and geometry, to prevent proper shutting in the presence of tall bags or a full load.

Billy: Welcome to the Club. I have ivory leather on my 300h and previously had light grey and beige on two 250s. On these latter two I found that the use of wipes (Armour, Sonax, Autoglym and other brands I don't recall) resulted, over time, in an unwelcome shine, almost certainly due to silicone among the ingredients. The original nice opaque satin factory-finish can be maintained with the 5% mild soap solution recommended in the owner's handbook, and also works perfectly well to remove denim stains. As a matter of fact, I am surprised by the amount of blue dye and/or dirt that comes off when I apply the solution to what appears to be clean leather every 2,000 km or so.

Michael: Your two posts come gratifyingly close to confirming my own conclusions of 28 June under Tank Range. My cumulative consumption (real) has now improved to 17.6 km/l (49.7 mpg) (read-out 17.9 km/l=50.6 mpg) after 21,500km, and this puts me within tantalisingly easy reach of precisely doubling the 8.9 km/l (25.1 mpg) I got after 235,000km in two 250s of which I otherwise retain fond memories. In other words, ".... 50 mpg [17.7 km/l] without really trying...." is proving to be not only a reasonable objective but also a personally satisfying one.

This is a strange post to be writing in August, the outside temperature recorded by my car when I parked it ten minutes ago having been 31°C, but here goes. I live at the bottom of a long incline which, at its steepest, is around 1:3 and consists of old cobblestones and smooth granite slabs. Snow and slush and possible ice can make it extremely difficult for cars to get up the slope and risky to go down it, so much so that the first sniff of frost in the air, maybe around mid-October, makes me head for the garage that stores and fits my winter tyres. In fact, this usually puts me ahead of local traffic regulations which make winter tyres or the availability of chains obligatory from November to March. Having taken delivery of my 300h in mid-October (18" wheels, rear 255/35), I drove only a couple of weeks with normal tyres before switching to winter ones (245/45/18, all four) until April. These were Yokohama W-Drives, whereas the two IS250s I previously drove were fitted, at various times, with Bridgestone Blizzaks, Goodyear Ultragrips, Pirelli Sottozeros or Michelin Alpins. This lack of loyalty to one brand rests on my inability to find an objective reason to other than marginally favour any single one over another in terms of grip, comfort, sllence or durability. And since I am suspicious of published reviews whose verdicts in a highly competitive business may derive from vested interests, I simply go for premium brands offered with deep discounts, preferably off-season when the discounts may be even deeper. Because this last winter was so mild as to protect my gleaming new 300h from the sort of slipping and sliding and fish-tailing which blights my otherwise fond memories of the 250s, I must withhold judgment of the car's performance in extreme conditions. Nevertheless, the experience of four or five days of compacted snow and subsequent deep slush make me optimistic, indeed very much so. With the TRC and VSC both off, Snow-mode on, and first gear engaged, the 300h kept a perfectly straight line up the aforementioned slope and once even moved off without hesitation after I was forced to stop at the steepest point. In similar circumstances, the 250s had been known to end up sideways before sliding back downhill. My personal impression is that the stability of the 300h, which is also noticeable in all bad-weather conditions, has less to do with improved weight distribution, good as this is, than with the graduality of response of the transmission and the effectiveness of the controls.

gtb5: I also looked at this twice when I first read it but concluded, apparently correctly, that it means "down to the position where it does not keep on blinking", namely, where it will stop, as per the factory setting, after three blinks. If you have not already done so, try it and see.

Five blinks are better than three, certainly when signaling intent in heavy motorway traffic. I read about this dealer-only customisation in the 300h's owner's manual only after taking delivery of the car, and had been planning to get it done with the first service. Unfortunately, it slipped my mind until the moment I picked up the car when all the workshop staff had already gone home. So my thanks to Dixgas for providing the link. The instructions, which are more complicated in the describing than the doing, worked fine. Still, it would be useful for Lexus to issue a recommendation to its dealers to advise customers of the option prior to delivery.

Richard1200: We are finally in agreement about something. Yes, the amount and nature of the data the 300h constantly puts in front of you is a distraction from the art (in my own case the simple act) of driving. The consumption data in their several variant forms always prompts me to respond with mental arithmetic of my own with an obvious loss of concentration on more important things such as the actions of pedestrians and other drivers. When I add to this the temptation to unnecessarily fiddle with the navi, audio and ventilation systems, I get a feeling of nostalgia for the sardine-can technology of the Citroen 2cv which was the first car I owned many decades ago. But on the other hand I suppose we have only ourselves to blame if we are the victims of an excess of technology, and it would be hypocritical of me to say otherwise.

RunningInPleasePass: Thanks for providing the "hillydriving" link. As correctly imagined by DJP my delight upon its perusal knew no bounds even if I would have preferred something a little less rich by way of breakfast reading. Nevertheless, having fully digested the piece along with my cornflakes, I approached my 300h with a purposeful mien and spring in my step and drove off in search of the nearest hill where I could test the accuracy of the equations and, hopefully, further consolidate the almost mystical bond between man and machine. I regret to report that my findings were inconclusive, and that, notwithstanding the yearnings of an eager public, I will never publish them. Seriously, I was interested to see that someone somewhere (actually the former Head of Physics at Virginia Tech) has devoted a heavy piece of thought to the subject. As for myself, it merely crossed my mind that possible adjustments to everyday driving techniques (even for those of us who live in valleys but frequently have to drive up and down the sides of them) could narrow the large disparities of fuel consumption in stretches of hill driving and therefore maybe enable greedy people like me to squeeze an extra few km out of the tank of what, in the case of the 300h, is already a very economic car. Since starting this Topic, I have seen that it has been raised at least once before in this Forum quite recently, when I must have missed it: see Tips for Mountain Driving, started by Dochybrid on June 10, 2014.

Richard: My sincere apologies for losing you halfway through my over-heavy post. I guess you must be one of the few 300h owners who do not look at the consumption figures in front of you. I admit I once turned them off for a whole day but the resulting loss of mental energy did not make me enjoy driving the car any better. I promise to throw a few jokes into any future post.

Living as I do in a hilly area, I constantly notice that my 300h's fuel consumption increases quite substantially during stretches of uphill driving. While this is not in itself unusual, I am nevertheless puzzled by the distances the car subsequently requires in order to revert to the original rates of consumption. These distances, which may be downhill or on the flat or, more usually, combinations thereof, are in my experience at least two or three times longer than the uphill ones, but they include so many variables in terms of gradients, curves, use of brakes, EV-mode etc., etc. that it is impossible to make meaningful comparisons. Does anyone know of a mathematical formula which enables a driver to estimate, all other things being equal, how far he needs to travel downhill in order to regain what he lost going uphill? And if any such formula exists, does it also apply the other way around? Namely, how far uphill will you expect to have driven before losing the saving obtained from the preceding downhill stretch? All this may sound academic, and it probably is, but I am nagged by the thought that better knowledge of the subject could point the way to improved driving technique and economy in the types of area in question.

Some recent Topics, e.g. "Tank Range" and "Fuel Warning Light" have skirted the subjects of the tank running dry and driving on reserve. Out of pure curiosity, I thought they might be worth a closer look. Conventional wisdom, perhaps erring on the side of caution, tells us that running out of fuel can (a) damage the fuel pump, and/or clog the injectors and fuel filter with gunge dredged up from the bottom of the tank. And if we make a habit of driving on reserve, the likelihood of one day needing to replace the parts in question is said to increase. We are also told that low fuel can lead to stalling when a car is driven uphill, the only sure way of totally eliminating the risk being never to drive with the tank less than a quarter full. Of course, drivers who enjoy seeing how far they can travel on reserve are not going to forgo the delights of a clenched anal sphincter by following the dictates of caution, but if they should ever run out of fuel on a motorway, they would be well advised not to admit that they were conscious of the possibility, let alone that they were in the process of testing it. In some countries, the initial offence of running out of fuel, usually punishable with a simple fine, might otherwise be compounded by a charge of reckless driving, which could lead to complications that do not bear thinking about, especially if an accident has occurred. Which brings us to the specific, and largely hypothetical, question of running out of petrol in a 300h. According to my dealer, who also sells Toyota, none of his customers have ever reported doing so in a hybrid. This he attributes to drivers of hybrids being "more prudent and rational in their thought processes than most people" (I'll take his word for it), but also to the reserve settings in what are already very economic cars being designed to give plenty of warning that you should get to a pump. The 300h warns you at 13-15% capacity (which is a long way short of the aforementioned 25% but good enough), meaning that you have, very pessimistically, at least 120km before running dry. Which, of course, should at all costs be avoided, not only because hybrids share all the potential empty-tank problems outlined above, but even more especially because of the dire consequences of the main battery becoming so depleted that it will fail to fire up the petrol engine as it is programmed to do. After three attempts, it will recognize there is no fuel supply and completely shut down pending refueling and a resetting of the fault code in the engine computer, the latter operation being possible only in a Lexus or Toyota workshop to which the car will have had to be towed (remem- bering to keep the rear wheels off the ground if a flatbed was not available). What this would mean in terms of cost and inconvenience I dread to think - and, frankly, I prefer never to find out.

This is to compare the consumption figures of my 300h after its first 16000km (10000 m.) and those of two 250s in which I did 130000km and 105000km respectively. The second 250 (2009 model) consumed slightly less than the first (2006), there having been some improvements to the efficiency of the engine, but I have averaged the data for the sake of simplification. My calculations are based (with a few rare exceptions) on the km driven between full-tank starts and low-fuel warnings divided by number of litres consumed. In the case of the 300h, the figures are cumulative and reflect the car's entire life so far, while those for the 250s ultimately became so predictable as to require no further monitoring. My driving mix typically consists of 10% Motorway/60% Provincial and Country Roads/ 20% Town Traffic/10% Big-City Traffic, and has changed little through the years though it may vary from one tankful to the next. My driving style is not particularly aggressive or twitchy, but a tendency to slightly exceed speed limits means that the figures could well be improved: 300h 17.0 km/l (My Calculation) = 48.0 mpg 17.2 km/l (Car Computer) = 48.6 mpg 250 8.9 km/l (My Calculation) = 25.1 mpg 9.1 km/l (Car Computer) = 25.7 mpg Three things are clear: 1. My fuel bill (and negative effect on the environment) is almost halved, which is very impressive; 2. Lexus' claims of 23.3 km/l (65.8 mpg) for the 300h and 11.0 km/l (31.1 mpg) for the 250 are meaningless in the real world (though perhaps useful for comparisons with other manufacturers and their models since the official parameters are the same for everyone); 3. Computer readings should not be taken as gospel, although they are not too far off the mark. With specific regard to the 300h's motorway performance, I can offer the following figures and thoughts, having just driven 1650km from south of Milan to Copenhagen, a trip I make twice a year. Because the usefulness of the hybrid system in motorway driving is reduced, and despite the lower power and number of cylinders in respect of the 250, I was not expecting much of a saving on fuel. I was, however, very pleasantly surprised. Variable weather conditions and heavy traffic, as well as frequent roadworks, especially in Germany, mean that an average speed of better than 100km/h for the entire stretch is a good result (110km/h was normal a decade ago), and this time I managed a creditable 103km/h. Total consumption for the trip according to the computer was an excellent 14.9 km/l (42.1 mpg) against the 8.3-8.6 km/l (23.4-24.3 mpg) I used to get with a 250. This means that after starting out with a full tank I would have needed to fill up only once en route, which I did after 846 km (525 miles), putting in 55.7 litres, the low-fuel warning having appeared at 837 km. The decision to fill up again 150km short of Copenhagen was therefore prompted solely by my unwillingness to make a final approach to the city with the car running on reserve. Needless to say, the entire trip was smooth and comfortable, and the car's cabin (with Mark Levinson and a snoozing wife for company) was a nice place to be when stuck in queues or crawling through German roadworks - and made even nicer as a result of the many interested glances received from drivers of the better brands of local machinery.

Wicksy: My advice would be that you should never use commercial products of any kind on the dashboard, simply because even the mildest have some degree of aggressiveness which, in the long term, will alter the surface being treated. In order to maintain a factory-fresh appearance for as long as possible, I would proceed as follows: 1. Frequently, and lightly, dust the dashboard with a dry microfibre cloth or glove until any dust particles are no longer visible. 2. Then, occasionally and only if necessary, pass the surfaces with a very slightly dampened microfibre cloth. You can, if you so choose, dampen the cloth with a very mild soapy solution (say 5%), and then give the surfaces a final wipe with a dry microfibre cloth kept for this specific purpose As a general rule, curb your enthusiasm and do not proceed beyond step 1. unless you deem it strictly necessary.

I recently had my 300h with ML in with the dealer for a week during which I was given a CT200 with standard audio as a courtesy car. Having always had ML systems as integral to the top-spec packages of the four IS's I have previously owned and therefore not having had a basis for comparison, the experience was a interesting one, and I am able to offer the following thoughts. (1) The clarity of the sound in the CT200, while acceptable and the equal of that of any standard Mercedes, BMW, Audi, Porsche, Volvo or Peugeot system I have experienced as a driver or passenger, was nowhere as good as that of the ML in the 300h, by which I mean that the clarity and detail were inferior in complex sounds of the type exemplified by symphony orchestras or jazz big-bands. Similarly, the combination of purity, realism and range on which the pleasure of listening to, for example, unaccompanied classical piano, chamber music or small-group jazz is much dependent, was far superior in the case of the ML. (2) As with most premium audio systems, whether domestic or mobile, the ML gives an impression of effortless performance, great reserves of unutilised power with no potential threat of distortion, and a general feeling of spaciousness. Not surprisingly, the standard system by comparison does not. (3) While it is difficult to say to what extent the foregoing impressions were influenced by the superior proofing of the 300h against road, tire and engine noise, I would judge the difference between models in this regard, if any, to be insufficient to invalidate the comparison. (4) As regards FM but more particularly DAB reception, I noted that the 300h is better in the sense that more stations are received for more of the time over a wider area. I really don't know if this has anything to do with a ML or non-ML system or whether the 300h simply has a better antenna (incorporated in the rear window and not sticking out of the roof as in the CT200). I would conclude that any music lover in possession of a substantial supply of well- recorded music of a nature that demands fidelity as distinct from mere adequacy of reproduction should plump for the ML system as a guarantee of excellence within the confines of a car that is in itself a product of excellence. In other words, if the cockpit of a 300h is a nice place to be, the ML makes it even nicer - and you are not going to procure the system anywhere else or reproduce your music better. Of course, the cost has got to be amortized over kilometers and time according to personal parameters, and even if the thought that Lexus has charged an extortionate price will always weigh on your mind, there are worse things in life on which to spend your money.