Infiniti G35 gets world’s first in-dash hard drive

Newswheel staff :: 18 April 2006 :: Filed under Saloon, Infinity, Infinity G35, Europe & UK

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Saloon and coupe pairing sport iPod rivalling CD-ripping tech

Hard drive-based music storage for your motor may seem like a no brainer. But development cycles in the car industry are a relative eternity compared with the frightening pace of change in computer technology. So, it’s taken until 2006 for a major car manufacturer to twig to the digital music revolution and wheel out a production vehicle with a factory-fitted hard drive-based sound system…

Although it’s been divulged that in-dash CD ripping will be supported, the storage capacity and form factor of the drive isn’t clear. Nissan / Infiniti has only referred to the drive with a worrying “9.5G” designation. If the disk does turn out to be limited to a rather feeble 9.5GB, it will be an extremely disappointing first foray for hard drive-equipped cars, given the current market for 60GB pocket-sized players.

For the record, the all-new G35 mid-sized luxury saloon was recently unsheathed at the New York City auto show. Due to go on sale in the US in November, the new G35 gets an uprated version of the same 3.5-litre V6 used in the Nissan 350Z sports coupe. Power is up to over 300bhp, while four-wheel-drive transmission is available as an option.

As with the rest of Nissan’s snazzy Infiniti range, the G35 ain’t available in the UK. More’s the pity…