Jaguar XJR Review

Jaguar XJR

In Car Entertainment and Satellite Navigation

The Jaguar XJR comes with a touch screen Alpine DVD Satellite Navigation system which allows you to enter full seven character Post Codes and it will navigate you seamlessly around Europe. If you run low on fuel as I did, the system will even automatically highlight local petrol stations. It is beginning to feel a little left behind by some of the state of the art systems, and is not as quick as the best but it is standard.

The music system, again is an Alpine system, and as with the Navigation system isn’t quite up there with the best, Volvo and Volkswagen have tie ups with Dynaudio and Audi with Bang Olfusen.  We see that Jaguar is now working with B&W and hopefully this will extend the XJ range in the near future. Saying that there is a 6 disc auto-changer in the boot and an array of speakers which will entertain the majority of owners.

Our test car was fitted with the rear in-car DVD entertainment system, which comprises of two TFT screens in the front seat head rests and a control panel mounted in the central rear arm rest. Rear seat passengers are able to listen to DVD’s or CD’s, etc via their own headphones or speakers.

All XJ's are fitted with Bluetooth technology which allows you to control your mobile phone from the steering wheel, it also acts as a hands free kit. It worked well with our Sony mobile telephone and was a welcome addition.

How It Looks - Exterior

Traditional Jaguar styling, you are not going to mistake the XJ, it retains strong design cues from the very first 60’s XJ model.

We weren’t too sure about the ‘R’ exterior styling, although fairly discreet the front and rear bumpers protrude a little too far. Behind the front wheel there is a plastic mock air intake, which strikes us as totally unnecessary.

How It Looks - Interior

Jaguar traditionalists will feel instantly at home in the cabin, it is a mix of leather and wood, very old school. Modernists can replace the wood with aluminium trim should they prefer.

In some areas the XJR was a little disappointing, for example the ash trays in the doors are made of a cheap plastic, where has the chrome gone, is it all about profit and weight?

Yes, there is switch gear from cars in Jaguar’s extended family and where we would prefer custom switches and buttons; we guess there have to be some savings.

Rivals

• Audi S8, BMW M5, Mercedes-Benz CLS Review