2014 vs. 2015 Ford Mustang: What's the Difference?

Fifty years after the original Mustang debuted, the new 2015 Ford Mustang marks the first time in a decade that the iconic pony car has received a complete redesign. With the 2015 Mustang, Ford says it has also created a vehicle that can effectively bridge the gap between what the Mustang has always been -- namely, an American icon that's a little rough around the edges -- and what the Mustang of the future will be: a globally viable rear-drive performance car.

While Ford has kept the current Mustang fresh through regular styling, engineering and feature updates, the model has lost market share to its natural arch rival, the Chevy Camaro, in recent years. Still, there exists a rabidly loyal fan base for the Mustang, one that has grown in size and intensity since Ford debuted a 1960s-themed model back in 2005. So these loyal Mustangers and buyers just now considering the purchase of their first pony car might be wondering what the differences are between the new car and the old car.

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2014 Alfa Romeo 4Cs - Small Review

Alfa Romeo 4C is a 237bhp two-seat thriller, which weighs 895kg and is capable 0-62mph in 4.5 secs

Verdict

The Alfa Romeo 4C looks superb, is awesome to drive and delivers supercar features for the price of a sports car. It’s more of a posh Lotus Elise than a true Porsche rival in terms of packaging, engine and ethos. The turbo engine is more about low-end shove than racing to the limiter, and Alfa has made compromises in quality and refinement to reduce weight. But for sheer driving thrills it’s difficult to beat, and a welcome return to form.

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2014 Alfa Romeo 4Cs | Video Photos Gallery

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2014 Chevrolet Camaro Z/28 - Small Test

This is America's track star.

Plucked from GM’s last track-day ­special, the 2013 Corvette Z06, the Z/28’s port-injected LS7 V-8 is fortified with new pistons and titanium connecting rods whose bearing inserts are now spray-coated for improved durability. There are also a cold-air intake, revised exhaust headers, and a repackaged dry-sump oiling system, but there’s more hardware that’s carry-over than new under the hood. At 505 horsepower and 481 pound-feet of torque, the Z/28’s LS7 makes just six more pound-feet than when this engine made its debut eight years ago.

As it did back then, the LS7 oozes power whether the Z/28 is standing still or at speed. The car quakes under a loping idle as heat radiates from the carbon-fiber extractor and blurs the view through the windshield. Racing toward a 7000-rpm redline, the Z/28 smears Barber’s manicured landscaping as if it were a still-wet watercolor, while the exhaust’s raucous bawl ­rattles the cabin. Zero to 60 mph passes in 4.4 seconds, and the quarter-mile clears in 12.7, by which time you’re doing 116 mph. True, the Z/28 isn’t as quick as the ZL1 in a straight line, but that’s not the point.

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2014 Chevrolet Camaro Z/28 | Video Photos Gallery

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Kia Optima 1.7 CRDi - Small Review

 

This is the enhanced-for-2014 Kia Optima, the Korean company’s diesel-only riposte to the sector Ford and Vauxhall once dominated with the Mondeo and Vectra, but now ruled by the BMW 3-series. If you’ve never seen one of these stylish saloons zip past you on the motorway, you’re probably not alone. They’re as rare as mermaids’ toes - Kia shifted just 507 Optimas in the UK in 2013, but anticipates sales to climb to 1000 in 2014, a growth spurt helped by a mild facelift.

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2014 Kia Optima 1.7 CRDi | Video Photos Gallery

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2014 Kia Soul 1.6 CRDi - Small Review

This is the new Kia Soul – we promise. Although it looks little changed from the quirky original that’s graced UK shores since 2009, Kia insists the new version has received a raft of deeper-than-skin changes to make it better to drive, and more upmarket inside. Those were the two areas the Soul desperately needed improvement in, so has it worked?

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2014 Kia Soul 1.6 CRDi | Video Photos Gallery

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2014 Land Rover Defender Challenge - Small Review

Never mind the physical contortions involved in climbing over that beefy rollcage, just getting your head around a Defender rally car requires some dexterity.

It’s pretty odd sitting up here, sawing at the wheel, diesel engine thrumming, rear end sliding across the grass and mud as your co-driver barks through the intercom. Fun, though; drive-it-until-you-run-out-fuel fun.

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2014 Land Rover Defender Challenge | Video Photos Gallery

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2014 Cadillac ATS Crimson Sport Edition Revealed

The all new Cadillac ATS Coupe may be getting all the attention lately, but the sedan gets some love for 2014 thanks to a new special edition called the Cadillac ATS Crimson Sport. We already think that the Cadillac ATS is a pretty sporty machine, and this new version offers up subtle exterior and interior enhancements that give the ATS a slightly sportier look to complement its exclusive Crimson Red Metallic exterior color.

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BMW X7 Three-Row SUV In Development

We’re seeing how the small luxury crossover market continues to expand, but it now appears that the large three-row luxury SUV market will also host at least one new player in the near future. According to a report from The Wall Street Journal, BMW will expand production at its Spartanburg, South Carolina factory in order to build a large luxury SUV called the BMW X7.

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Small Feature : 2014 Land Rover Range Rover Sport

Taking a Range Rover to the track may not be as far-fetched as you think given the performance aspirations of the new 2014 Land Rover Range Rover Sport V-8 Supercharged. In this episode of World’s Fastest Car Show, host Justin Bell takes this 510-hp brute around the circuit to see if it lives up its “sport” moniker.

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2014 McLaren P1 Small Review

DUNSFOLD, England – Does the world need another constructor of unaffordable high-end sports cars, like the 2014 McLaren P1? No question.


In fact, this is the best time for McLaren to extend its range of road cars and take advantage of its heritage as the second most successful Formula 1 team after Ferrari. McLaren has design and engineering clout and provenance that Pagani and Konigsegg can’t match.


McLaren—eight-time winner of the World Constructors’ Championship—can’t claim its cars have lane-departure control, full-stop active cruise control, or other active safety features that get them a step or two from becoming autonomous. A McLaren has no big touchscreen in the center of the dash. Like Ferrari, McLaren has no plans to add a four-door or a crossover/utility vehicle to its lineup.

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2015 Mercedes-Benz C400 4Matic Small Review

MARSEILLE, France – Because it competes with the BMW 3-series, which almost singlehandedly coined the term "sport sedan," the Mercedes-Benz C-class often gets compared as one. But it's not a sport sedan, and that's just fine, as European bureau chief Georg Kacher makes clear in his review of the European-spec, rear-wheel-drive Mercedes-Benz C250. Mercedes will introduce the car in the United States exclusively in all-wheel-drive form, as the four-cylinder C300 4Matic and the six-cylinder C400 4Matic. We had the opportunity to drive the new Benz C400 4Matic a couple of weeks after Georg's review of the not-for-U.S. C250.

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2014 Toyota Highlander Photos - Video Gallery

2014 Toyota Highlander First Drive Review and Road Test




2014 Toyota Highlander small overlap IIHS crash test

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2014 Toyota Highlander: Around the Block

This is the latest in our new series of short-take reviews, in which we concentrate on a car or truck with a powertrain or trim level not previously detailed. –Ed.

As the three-row crossover becomes America's de facto family car, the genre takes on an increasingly important role in an automaker's lineup. The newly redesigned 2014 Toyota Highlander, then, picked an opportune time to up its game. It may be largely carryover mechanically, but it looks and feels significantly upgraded.

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2015 Jeep Renegade: Meet the new small Jeep

 

 Neither Jeepster nor Laredo, a Renegade bows at the Geneva motor show

Meet the 2015 Jeep Renegade, arriving today at the Geneva motor show. The Renegade marks Jeep's latest attempt at a small SUV, following the widely panned Caliber-based Compass and Patriot; both are expected to die shortly.

Overall appearance suggests a sort of ruggedized Kia Soul/Nissan Cube, with a combination of sharply angular and rounded forms competing with one another. Jeep calls it “Tek-Tonic,” and while some elements like the taillights come off cartoonish, there's no denying it's a far more attractive machine than the dumpy Compass.

New is the My Sky open roof option, offered in a base manual removable configuration or an upgraded removable with power-tilt/slide setup. A nod to the Wrangler's Freedom Top, My Sky consists of honeycomb fiberglass polyurethane roof panels that can be yanked off and stowed in the cargo area during nice weather. The same X motif found in the taillights makes its way into the My Sky panels, debossed into the material.

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2014 Hyundai Equus Ultimate ~ little notes

 

Hyundai's luxury flagship sedan is improving

DIGITAL EDITOR ANDREW STOY: If you want an example of how quickly the Koreans are evolving their luxury-car strategy, the Equus is a perfect example. This car became the flagship just a few years ago, yet the next Genesis -- a model one step down from Equus in the lineup -- is clearly superior in just about every way. If the next Genesis is that good, what will the next Equus be like? Will there even be a next Equus?

As Hyundai should remember, building a brand in the United States is a daunting prospect. That's essentially what the company is trying to do with Equus. The going has been slow: Hyundai sold only 352 Equus sedans in December 2013 and a total of around 3,500 for the entire year.

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2014 Volkswagen Passat SEL Premium ~ litte notes

The 2014 Volkswagen Passat SEL Premium starts at $31,715. Photo by Volkswagen.

ASSOCIATE EDITOR GRAHAM KOZAK: What you see is pretty much what you get with this 2014 Volkswagen Passat SEL Premium, except where the engine -- a little 1.8-liter turbo four -- is concerned. Considering its humble 170-hp output, it's surprisingly capable of getting the car moving. It's not even a torque monster, though its 184 lb-ft are fully accessible from 1,500 rpm.

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BMW X4 Sports Activity Coupe | Images Gallery & Video |

BMW X4 HD 2014 Sports Activity Coupe USA Made First Commercial - 2014 

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BMW introduces X4 Sports Activity Coupe

   

BMW
Gets choice of two turbo engines

BMW confirmed the rumored new X4 Sports Activity Coupe, sort of a smaller BMW X6. According to BMW, the X4, like the X6, combines the performance and capability of a sports-activity vehicle with coupe styling. U.S. versions have a choice of two turbo engines. The xDrive28i has BMW's 240-hp, 2.0-liter four cylinder and costs $45,625 (including destination and handling). The top-of-the-line xDrive35i wears a $48,925 sticker (again including destination and handling) and has the 300-hp, 3.0-liter straight six. Both models have an eight-speed automatic transmission with paddles as well as xDrive, BMW's all-wheel drive system. The xDrive35i should hit 60 mph in 5.2 seconds, the xDrive28i in six seconds flat.

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2016 Audi TT and TTS Revealed in Geneva

 

After months of teasers and previews, Audi has finally revealed the 2016 Audi TT sports coupe at the 2014 Geneva auto show. The new TT is based on the Volkswagen Group’s MQB modular platform, features an innovative interior design, and boasts a stylish look that breaks new ground while still retaining design cues from previous TT models.

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2015 Volvo XC90 Spied

The 2015 Volvo XC90 SUV will be the first Volvo to follow the stylish design direction of the well-received Volvo Concept XC Coupe, and our spy photographer caught a camouflaged version of this luxury crossover testing on ice. Although this prototype is heavily disguised, we can see that the XC90 will have a similar greenhouse as the current car, with a longer hood and a curvier rear end to up its style quotient.

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Bugatti Veyron Legend Car Premieres at Geneva

Bugatti is now halfway through its six-part “Legends of Bugatti” series, and the French supercar brand is poised to present the line’s fourth model at the 2014 Geneva auto show. Bugatti will build just three examples of the new Rembrandt Bugatti Legend car, which will continue to be based on the Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Grand Sport Vitesse convertible.

The latest Bugatti Legend car will be named after the brother of company founder Ettore Bugatti, Rembrandt Bugatti, who was also a significant 20th century sculptor. The radiator decoration on the old Bugatti Type 41 Royale featured a dancing elephant, referring to one of Rembrandt’s most important works. On the sculptor’s namesake Legends car, the driver will be greeted by a cast-bronze dancing elephant integrated into the rear center box between the seats. We imagine it’s the only example of an elephant traveling 254 mph on the ground.

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2014 Buick Regal GS AWD Review

Montebello, Quebec — Buick wanted the chance to show off the new, all-wheel-drive 2014 Buick Regal GS AWD, and Canada seemed like a suitable locale for an icy driving expedition. All-wheel drive just became available for the recently refreshed 2014 Buick Regal, and the conditions this time of year around Montreal, Quebec, certainly promised to put Buick's new system to the test.

While we've got a fair share of icy roads around our editorial offices in Ann Arbor, Michigan, French Canadians dismiss our quaint predicament with “c'est mignon!” For those living in the rural communities outside of Montreal, “road” doesn't always mean asphalt, and frozen rivers double as seasonal, state-maintained ice bridges.

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Mercedes-Benz Adding Dealers, Models to Van Line in U.S.

It's been said imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. If that's the case, the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter has a lot of fans, even among other automakers. Since its introduction to the U.S. market in the early 2000s, the Sprinter now faces several similarly-configured competitors in the form of the Ram ProMaster, the Nissan NV full-size vans, and the forthcoming Ford Transit

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Report: Volkswagen Low-Cost Brand Delayed by Cost, Quality Issues

As car sales in developed markets are flattening, sales in emerging markets such as Russia, China, India and Africa are hotter than ever and growing. To appeal to consumers in these markets, automakers the world over have rushed to introduce lower-cost, value-oriented models. Nissan resurrected its Datsun brand, Renault acquired Dacia in 1999, and General Motors recently introduced the Baojun brand in China

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Diesels: What's all the clatter about?

What's all this clatter about diesels lately? 

Why now? Why twenty years after we, as a country, have lost interest in the slow, smoky Mercedes and Volkswagens that became synonymous with Diesel power? You can thank your government.
See, for years, residents living in countries with less than fifty states have been enjoying the fuel economy benefit of diesel passenger cars - they consume on average about thirty percent less than comparably powerful gasoline models - while we lumbered along in our thirsty, gasoline-powered SUVs. The reason we didn't get the miserly diesels is simple: the quality of the diesel fuel available in this country was too poor to run the new engines on.

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EPA Planning to Phase In Lower-Sulfur Gasoline

The sophistication, power and efficiency of the internal-combustion engine continues to improve year-to-year, making prognostications of the demise of the ICE engine seem further and further out. From a hardware standpoint, automakers have implemented highly sophisticated hardware to meet ever-stricter fuel economy and emissions regulations, but the one area they can't directly control is fuel quality. The Environmental Protection Agency phased in ultra-low-sulfur diesel fuel starting in 2007, and is proposing to do the same with gasoline starting in 2017, bringing the allowable sulfur levels from 30 parts per million (PPM) to 10 PPM, according to a Bloomberg report.

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Price of 2014 Nissan NV200 Increases $250

It may not be fancy or glamorous, but the Nissan NV200 has found its niche in the U.S. market for its straightforward, no-nonsense functionality. It follows the Ford Transit Connect to the U.S. market for businesses that don't need the size, and don't want the fuel consumption of a larger van. It is also serving as the basis for the 2015 Chevrolet City Express compact van. For the 2014 model year, prices on the NV200 are going up $250 respectively on both the S and SV trims, Nissan announced in a press release.

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Porsche Renews Contract Of CEO Matthias Muller

The Porsche AG board announced Friday that it voted to renew the contract of Matthias Müller, company president and chairman of the executive board. The new contract takes effect in January 2015, meaning Müller is poised to run Porsche through at least 2020.

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2015 Nissan GT-R Nismo Priced At $151,585

We expected that the all-wheel-drive 2015 Nissan GT-R Nismo would deliver on performance, and now we know that it will also deliver a knockout punch to your wallet. At $151,585 after destination, it is nearly 50 percent pricier than the stock Nissan GT-R, which begins at $103,365.

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Koenigsegg Agera One:1 Bound for Geneva Show

In honor of the 20th anniversary since Christian von Koenigsegg’s decision to start his own supercar brand, the Koenigsegg Agera One:1 will debut at the 2014 Geneva auto show. This latest ultra-performance offering from the Swedish boutique brand, which Koenigsegg had dubbed the world’s first "megacar," boasts an insane one-to-one power-to-weight- ratio.

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