[fideba2]

Yesterday, I've finally had a one hour test drive in a First Edition i-Pace. As a current Jaguar XE and ex-Audi Q5 driver, let me try to summarize in an objective way.

- First of all: the drive. That's the easy one: simply amazing. I never drove an electric car before (ok, I did drive a hybrid Toyota Yaris once a few weeks ago, let's not dwell on that The performance of the car is unbelievable. Imagine sitting in an airplane that takes off, and multiply the experience by 5.
- What I found the most amazing, is that, while blasting off is mindblowing (my children went nuts, and so did I), the car drives excellent at any speed, being it on small roads, the highway, in dense traffic, ... Regenerative breaking really doesn't take more than 5 minutes to get use to, pretty sure I would leave that on and never think about it again. I expected it to be a very "nervous" car when driving slow, but none of that. Excellent drive, period
- the Heads-on-display is very cool, and way better than the XE one. It now shows clear exists, and counts down when approaching (not like the pretty weird way it's implemented in the XE). No brainer.
- Fit and finish: mixed feelings. Taken into account that this is a 100K+ car (First edition), I still see some things I don't like. Finish of the buttons (plastic windows buttons), ... These are things that would never be found in a high class Audi. A pitty
- also there were cracks and noises that shouldn't be there (100K+ car, remember ?)

- And then we arrive at the multimedia system. Oh boy... It's worse than I ever imagined
=> changing regenerative breaking mode takes 6 button presses. Same thing for the "car sound". Everything seems extremely well hidden
=> The thing is slow. At times slower than my XE (which is slow)
=> I've been in computers for over 30 years, writing code, designing user interfaces, .... And I did NOT find a way of entering my home address... I repeat: did not find it. Only thing that worked was looking for charging points. Without any doubt I was missing something obvious, but it's unbelievable that I need to search for this. Admittedly, I've only search for 5 minutes, but that's waaaay to much for any car navigation system
=> I did not manage to enter a destination using voice recognition. Not a single time
=> Some buttons worked "sometimes". Pressing the voice recognition button worked about 50% of the time. And the lack of response of the system ensured that I didn't know if the system was now listening, or canceled. Sigh...

All in all: totally amazing car. Those who already bought it will have a blast driving it. But for me, the fit and finish and multimedia system will have me check out the Audit e-tron first.

 

[Blackseries]

Many thanks for taking the time to write your review - its good to get a normal persons perspective.

My local dealer won't let their Demo car go out to the public until a "major software update" has been done.
Hopefully that will address some of the issues.

Rather disappointed about the squeaks - TBA Software interfaces don't really bother me that much - but the main benefit if an electric car should be the silence.

 

[Tophe74]

Hi, thx for this feedback.
Like Blackseries i don t care mu h if their are some plastic things. But the squeacks are unacceptable in a premium car. I didn t have any in my BMW neither in my Audi ! and they was all half price of FE !
Hope to have test drive in August.

 

[Guest]

Excellent Feedback, I too currently drive and XE, so know that if you are saying that the I-Pace has a worse infotainment system, it must be very bad indeed. I will hope that the demo cars may still not be fully representative of the install in vehicles that will roll off the dock in a couple of months time, but I will now be prepared for the worst!

I will stick with the I-Pace, regardless of how bad the infotainment system turns out to be. I know that Audi have one of the best - I had to use an Audi A5 recently, and compared to the XE's their system was a breath of fresh air, but I could never forgive the Audi its poor stop-start technology (that couldn't resist the car rolling back at any challenging hill start). Dynamically the XE has never disappointed, and it sounds as though the I-Pace is going to prove a delight. I just need to work out how I am going to mount my i-phone in the I-Pace to continue serving as my primary navigation system.

 

[Blackseries]

I just need to work out how I am going to mount my i-phone in the I-Pace to continue serving as my primary navigation system.

I think customer cars will have Apple Carplay ...... the last Velar software update got it ..... so I'm sure the I-Pace will have it

 

[Tophe74]

Yes and last velar's uptwate seems to have improve response times to.

 

[Paul J.]

Coming from a Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV, which has THE worst 'infotainment' system known to man, woman, child or beast, I can be quietly confident that the software in the I-pace will be a big improvement, even if the update doesn't address the OP's concerns! :lol:

 

[oop north]

I have a test drive next Wednesday morning - looking forward to it and I will report back

I am not bothered about the engine noise and regeneration options being buried in the menus - I will switch the engine noise off once and regeneration to maximum once and then never change them again! I have an i3 and the regen is a great way to drive - it becomes a challenge never to touch the brake pedal on a journey.

On the software, my i3 nav sometimes takes a couple of minutes to start up, so not too worried about slightly slow response - it'll be better than my 2010 Discovery 4 anyway! Oh, and it will hopefully be better than the 2017 Merc GLE I had for a couple of weeks recently - took me three days to work out how to change the speaker settings (increase bass) despite several concerted efforts with the car stationary, and a whole week to work out how to put an address in the nav

 

[fideba2]

I have a test drive next Wednesday morning - looking forward to it and I will report back

I am not bothered about the engine noise and regeneration options being buried in the menus - I will switch the engine noise off once and

Yep, that's what I thought: no way I'll leave the fake engine noise on. But after having driven it, I'm not so sure. It's really, really well done. Can't explain it, you'll have to drive it to know

 

[Feldmm]

Test Drive
I had a test for one hour yesterday - these have just gone live in the UK.
Really a remarkable car - have previously tested both the Tesla X and S.
The main advantages of the the ipace over the Teslas are in my view
1] The ride quality is much much better than the air - air sus / 20 inch wheels -
2] The interior finish is in a different league. The Teslas feel like a 30 000 pound car the Jaguar like a prestige brand - incidentally the interiour of the ipace is a step up from the Fpace.
3] The handling is much better

The car just shrinks around you and it is an excellent compromise for space and size - I currently drive an XJR and a Discovery 4.
The pickup on accelleration is superb - both from a start and even more so from mid range. As they say it corerns flatly
Generally fantastic but the following should be borne in mind.

I tested an SE - with 20 inch wheels - the seating did NOT have any lumbar adjustment - the HSE and first do this really is a bit mean and even a manual adjustment should be mandatory in a car of this quality

The only other issue is the brakes - the regeneration works well but on urgent braking you really feel the weight of the car. I would be very interested if there are any compartive figures on stopping distance in say an XE and the ipace

In one hour of quite fast driving we used up 60 miles of range! I guess we travelled about 25 miles.
The range is the one issue that might be a problem here - as the car begs to be driven enthusiastically - or what is the point?. I suspect fast driving will mean a range of about 150/180 not a problem for a good commute but nowhere near 300.

Overall very impressed - have a FE - Corris Gray on order

 

[Tophe74]

Nice feedback thx.
For the range, i suppose u didn t normal driving as u want to test the car. But yes, will all this power its tempting to put the pedal down . Not a problem for every days driving i suppose u don t do 150 miles every days. So u can enjoy it without worrying of range and with a low cost of "refueling" at home.
And when u need to go farther like for hollydays, u press eco mode and drive with egg under the foot.
For me not a real problem as i ll ride 200 more miles like 4 or 5 times a year. Even if i need to stop 2 hrs for big travel its not a big deal.
Sometimes ppl forget that we don t buy electric car for saving gaz money but for saving the planet and our childs. So if i needs some concession am ok with that.

 

[Megter]

Hi all,

I'll be enjoying the Ipace for a full day on August 7.
In particular, I'm interested to see the range (I do approximately 30-35K miles of which most highway), as well as the acc and steering assist (have not found any video how it works in practice).

If you have any specific questions, please let me know.

 

[FENorway]

Sometimes ppl forget that we don t buy electric car for saving gaz money but for saving the planet and our childs. So if i needs some concession am ok with that.

I buy it because an electric drivetrain in all aspects are superior to an ICE-drivetrain with same power.
Smoothness, vibration, noise, (turbo) lag etc.

 

[Tophe74]

Hi all,

I'll be enjoying the Ipace for a full day on August 7.
In particular, I'm interested to see the range (I do approximately 30-35K miles of which most highway), as well as the acc and steering assist (have not found any video how it works in practice).

If you have any specific questions, please let me know.

35k a year mostly highway ! Am not sure an electric car as it is nowdays will be good for that ! U ll spend most of your time charging.
I think 180 miles will be the max range on highway and thats not bad. So it means with 100kw charger u ll spend around 200 hrs charging / year.

 

[duncanrohan]

Hi all,

I'll be enjoying the Ipace for a full day on August 7.
In particular, I'm interested to see the range (I do approximately 30-35K miles of which most highway), as well as the acc and steering assist (have not found any video how it works in practice).

If you have any specific questions, please let me know.

35k a year mostly highway ! Am not sure an electric car as it is nowdays will be good for that ! U ll spend most of your time charging.
I think 180 miles will be the max range on highway and thats not bad. So it means with 100kw charger u ll spend around 200 hrs charging / year.

I assumed he meant 35 miles a day driving, but let's say he did mean 35K a year; at say 200 days of driving (the working year) that's 175 mils a day (conveniently within the ipace range) which means he never spends ANY time charging (other than when he is asleep) and saves hours and hours of time at petrol stations. Excellent savings in time and money!

 

[Tophe74]

ok if its spread equaly on days and he comes back home every days. But 90 miles to go work is a lot.
Just warning him. Indead it depends how he does his miles.

 

[Megter]

It's per year, forgot to mention that.
I very frequently travel 80 miles one way, so 160 miles is what I should be able to cover without charging. In some cases, I'll be able to charge at point of destination (working on it to increase that rate).

 

[duncanrohan]

It's per year, forgot to mention that.
I very frequently travel 80 miles one way, so 160 miles is what I should be able to cover without charging. In some cases, I'll be able to charge at point of destination (working on it to increase that rate).

Perfect! I've had a Model S for 18 months and only once ever charged anywhere other than home. I resent going to petrol stations...

 

[DrPhil]

Hi Feldmm,

I think you did not drive so fast as you thought. You wrote "In one hour of quite fast driving we used up 60 miles of range! I guess we travelled about 25 miles. "
If you drove fast for one hour but only did 25 miles, I must disagree that you drove fast.

 

[Feldmm]

Quite, but there was actually lot of sitting around, looking at the nav and other features, and swapping over drivers action couple of times, hence the lie average speed