Infiniti M56 - Performance. Luxury. Technology.

Infiniti, the upscale division of Nissan, has presented various interpretations of upscale transportation throughout its two decades of existence. The M sedan is today's halo car, with a pleasing blend of performance, luxury and technology. Style and craftsmanship are the mortar between those three bricks.

Just listing the amazing array of features on this midsize BMW/Mercedes/Audi/Lexus competitor would take up more room than I have, so we'll have to look at some representative examples.

Performance is a great place to start. There are two available engines--the 3.7-liter, a 330-horsepower V6 found in the M37 and the mighty 5.6-liter V8, with 420 horsepower and 417 lb.-ft. of torque, that sits beneath the curvaceous hood of the M56. Both engines come mated to a seven-speed automatic. The car comes standard with traditional rear-wheel-drive but you can request the Intelligent All-Wheel-Drive system if you are concerned about traction.

My 2013 M56 was rated at 16 City, 24 Highway, with an average of 19 mpg by the EPA. I accumulated 17.1 mpg--not bad, but premium fuel was running nearly $5.00 a gallon during my test. The 2012 model earned a 6 for Air Pollution and 3 for Greenhouse Gas from the EPA. Big engines have trouble getting a good Greenhouse Gas score, but you can carefully control an engine of any size for low emissions.

Luxury is both a look and a feel. What other motorists see is a bold, curvilinear design that has borrowed something from classic British Jaguars and Bentleys but is comfortably informal too. It's almost prettier than you expect, and it's comforting to look out the windshield at the sensuously proportioned hood. My tester was a Platinum Graphite M56--a formal gray that fits for a car of this caliber.

Luxury is best represented inside, with sublime leather seating, Japanese Ash trim and the long list of amenities that are expected at this price point and market segment. Yes, there's dual-zone climate control, but this car has something even better--Forest Air. As part of the Sport Package (more on this later), it removes odors and then distributes the breeze in an irregular, outdoorsy way. Oddly, when it's  varied like this you are actually more aware of it.

Technology may be the most important ingredient in this super car. A rear-view monitor is nothing that special today, but how about a rear sonar system that detects objects? You have access to the Zagat restaurant guide through the Hard Drive Navigation System, along with traffic and weather information. Rain sensing windshield wipers are no longer a new idea but they fit right in here, along with automatic on-off High Intensity Discharge headlamps.

If you really want technology, though, you have to order the $3,050 Technology package. Here you get a blind spot warning system that tells you, with lights, when someone's next to you where you can't see them in your mirrors. The next step is Blind Spot Intervention, where the rear brakes automatically kick in to guide you away if you try to turn into an occupied lane.

If no-one's there but you need to stay in your lane, the Lane Departure Warning and Lane Departure Prevention systems are there to protect you. Active Trace Control fine tunes engine torque and four wheel braking to keep you poised on curving roads. Forward Collision Warning is part of the braking package that lets you know with flashing lights if you're coming up too quickly on someone in moving traffic. My least favorite part of the Technology Package was the Eco Pedal, which pushes back at you if you drive too vigorously. I'm glad to save gas and the environment, but that's too much nannying.

Further enhancing my tester was the Sport Package ($5,650) that introduced stunning 20-inch wheels to go with lots of "sport" features, such as the Sport front fascia (dark instead of chrome), Sport brakes with four pistons in the front disc and two in the rear. How about Sport seats in front? A Sport-tuned suspension? Four wheel active steering sounds pretty exotic--and Nissan/Infiniti has experimented with it for a while. It just enhances the feeling of agility of this two-ton ride.

Craftsmanship? The pieces fit together perfectly, the materials are top-level and there is such a wealth of things to look at and touch. It's hard to think of anything that could be missing here. The side panels are made of aluminum to save weight, but are hand-inspected to be perfect. You won't get that on a Nissan Sentra.

You'll pay for the privilege of driving an M56. It starts at $61,100, and when you add in the $895 shipping charge you're touching $62K. With the Technology and Sport packages, the bottom line for my car was $70,195.

However, driving a car like this puts you in a different frame of mind. Everything is so lovely, so comfortable and so silent (they even have Active Noise Control, which counteracts engine, road and wind noise). You feel more relaxed in stop-and-go commuting. It feels good to move your eyes and hands over the swirling, exuberant trim and pieces inside. I often found myself feeling the armrest, the steering wheel, the dash, the console.

It's been a long haul for Infiniti--they haven't been the sales star that Lexus has been--but they definitely have found their way today and offer a beautiful alternative to the other upscale four-wheeled choices.

Infiniti JX Crossover - Watch out for Acronyms!

In the early 1960's, musical comedian Allan Sherman took the Jewish song "Hava Nagila" and parodied it as "Harvey and Sheila." Once Sherman got underway, he started including a long list of acronyms--"Harvey's a CPA, he works for IBM..."

In the musical Hair there's the song, Initials (L.B.J.), which starts out, "LBJ took the IRT..." Acronyms abound today, and with the Infiniti JX, they are omnipresent.

The JX boasts a long list of safety and convenience features--all acronyms--that make this one of the most high-tech rides I've ever had.

Where to begin? Let's start with BCI-- Backup Collision Intervention. It can tell if a vehicle is approaching from either side as you're backing up. If a car appears to be entering your path, it gives you three layers of warning - a light, a sound and, if you don't do anything, through the pedal itself. It can apply brake pressure  if you don't take action right away, saving you from disaster.

There's so much more. The Around View Monitor (AVM), with Moving Object Detection (MOD) shows you a 360 degree view around the car--it looks like a direct overhead bird's eye view--and then warns you of possible problems around you. Along with the BCI, this electronic nanny could be a lifesaver, but it also seems to assume that drivers aren't bothering to look around them as they're driving.

The list continues. The Lane Departure Warning (LDW) system, with the even more overt Lane Departure Prevention (LDP) system use a camera behind the front mirror that monitors the lines in the road to see if you're keeping near the center of your lane. If you don't respond to the warning light or buzzer, the system can exert braking on the opposite side of the car to help pull it away from danger. '

Still with me? The Blind Spot Warning (BSW) system flashes a light if there's someone in your blind spot along the side, and makes a noise if you put on the turn signal while you're driving along with that left-lane person. It can help straighten you out if necessary with braking inputs. The standard Tire Pressure Monitoring System (TPMS) includes an individual tire pressure display and Tire Inflation Indicator.This is just the top of the list.

Despite this parade of high-tech inventions, the car holds seven passengers, all in comfort, and offers an interesting new design language for Infiniti. It's nice looking, but does have a large, chrome fish mouth much like its FX and EX siblings, and the rear corner window pillar features what they're calling a "crescent" shape - more like a jiggle.

You may recall that Infiniti's first car, the Q45, was a large sedan with no grille at all--just a Samurai belt buckle on the nose--and it was introduced with a head-scratching campaign that didn't even show the car--just trees and rocks.

Well, the all-new JX is quite powerful, with its 265-horsepower 3.5-liter V6 engine. With 248 lb.-ft. of torque, it's no slug on the road despite its 4,419 pound weight. Fuel economy, per the EPA, is an average of 20 mpg--I got 18.7. (EPA figures are 18 City, 23 Highway). Green Vehicle Guide numbers are 6 for the Smog score and apparently 4 for Greenhouse Gas. The standard and only gearbox is a continuously variable transmission, which comes with either two- or all-wheel drive.

My Black Obsidian tester had power to all four wheels. Inside, on the console, is the Infiniti Drive Mode selector. Use the dial to choose from Standard, Sport, Snow and Eco modes. A car with the brains of this one can alter many things, including throttle response and transmission behavior, so you can customize the car to your liking.

The three rows seating is especially flexible with a sliding middle row, which you can move up to 5.5 inches up or back to supply more legroom in the second row or maximize cargo capacity.

This is one luxurious vehicle, but my tester had four extra packages on it. The Technology Package included not only some of the high tech goodies mentioned above, but a heated steering wheel and remote start. Remote start lets you, as seems obvious, start the car without being in it. Why do that? Well, on a hot day you can get it cooled off before stepping in; on a cold day, vice versa.

The Theater Package provides dual seven-inch monitors in the back of the rear seats with wireless headphones to entertain your passengers.

The Deluxe Touring Package jazzes up the the exterior with 20-inch alloy wheels and the inside with a potent Bose Cabin Surround sound system. Letting the outside into the inside is a panoramic sunroof to give a sky view to second and third row passengers. Rain sensing windshield wipers wipe just when needed. This is no less miraculous than the drier that stops when it can tell your clothes are dry. Climate-controlled front seats (they cool too) and heated seats for rear passengers live in this extra package.

The Premium Package serves up Infiniti Connection with a navigation system. With voice recognition, you can request things like Zagat restaurant guide information and traffic reports along with simply requesting directions. Infiniti Connection gives you electronic access in an emergency, much like the well-known OnStar system.

The JX, assembled in Smyrna, Tennessee, starts at $40,650 for the two-wheel-drive model and $42,050 for the all-wheel drive one (plus $950 for transportation--doesn't that sound like a lot?). My tester, with all its extras, including roof rails, came to $55,170, which puts it in some rarefied company in the marketplace.

Infiniti FX 35 - Swirly Curly

My mother was impressed with the Infiniti FX 35 luxury crossover. She's the one who called it "swirly curly." But you've got to admit that it is that.

The FX gets a new face this year, and a special new model--the Limited Edition. My test car was that model. Offered in a special Iridium Blue exterior color, it boasts 21-inch 10-spoke aluminum-alloy graphite finish wheels with P265/45R21 V-rated all-season tires, dark-tinted headlights with Adaptive Front lighting System (AFS) and auto-leveling, and dark-tinted side air vents and lower door trim. Other features for this special vehicle include aluminum roof rails and roof rail crossbars with graphite finish, aluminum pedals, graphite floor mats with unique blue piping, Infiniti Hard Drive Navigation System, Around View® Monitor (AVM) and much more.

The original sport utility vehicles (SUVs) were truck-based and boxy, but the tall, people-and-stuff-hauling crossovers are anything but. And Infiniti (Nissan) gave the sensuous exuberance of their cars to the big FX 35.

There's plenty of power from the 3.5-liter V6--303 horsepower to be exact--and intelligent all-wheel-drive handles the light offroading chores. There's a ski mode for going up to the cabin in Lake Tahoe, but you won't want to do much more dirty driving than that. You don't want to damage those 21-inch rims!

You get 16 City, 21 Highway (18 mpg average) from the EPA. I averaged 19.2 mpg. The EPA Green Vehicle Guide numbers are 5 for Air Pollution and just 3 for Greenhouse Gas. 

It's a world of leather inside, where the rounded look continues. You'll find hides on the seats, (with 10-way heating), steering wheel and shift knob. The panels have an "inflated" or convex feel to them, implying fullness and richness.

All this good stuff will cost you. The sticker on my tester was $52,445.

I like the way you can see the curving front fenders from the driver's seat. So often these days you can't see the outside of the car at all from there. It was smooth sailing for this big beauty.