mrdeeno

I took my car in for a brake job and got a G35x loaner. This is the first time I was actually in a G35, so I figured I'd do a brief comparo. It's not a fair comparison considering the G35x is a stripped loaner car with almost 10k miles, but I'm going to try to keep in check things that I think are better, when in reality it's just because I'm "used to" it.

1. Exterior - The "tone" of the M vs. the G35x is about the same...both lean on the tasteful conservative side with the M-sport being a tad more "sporty". I think the G's styling looks a tad more refined based on the grille, rim design, and the tail lights (with the blinker inside the LED circle rather than a separate part of the tails). The G35x is smaller and definitely looks smaller, but this is probably due to the M being a "large car" per EPA classification.

2. Interior - Not night and day between the two, more like dusk and day. But i guess that's the difference between being luxury and "near" luxury. The materials in the G35 are ok, but looked and felt cheaper than in the M. I wasn't too impressed by the aluminum trim in the G35 and the wasabi paper look or whatever it's called. It actually made the aluminum look dull and plasticky. The center stack looked "bare", probably because it wasn't as physically substantial as the M. For example, the preset buttons in the G are little round buttons and not full buttons. As cool as the purplish gauges looked, I wasn't too impressed with it, but probably because the gauges were too small and the lettering/number too big. Overall, the interior felt smaller because it obviously was smaller, and this is just a case of not being used to it.

3. Driving - The throttle is MUCH more difficult to modulate than in the M45 (not sure how it feels in the M35). It may be a case of me being used to my car, but I think that's only a small part of it. It was almost difficult to start smoothly, no matter how hard I tried. The engine noise in the M45 (again, not sure about the M35) is present just enough to know it's there, but in my loaner G35x, it was LOUD to the point that I was like "WTF??" I guess it isn't objectionable, but I'm not used to that much engine noise (almost as loud as my '97 4runner when I accelerate hard).

I would say the steering requires 20-25% more effort in the G35 than the M. Again, I am not used to this so it could be "normal", but I still find feel it requires more effort than what would be considered "normal". Maybe this is to preserve more roadfeel or whatever.

The G35x "felt" fast, but I can't tell if it's because it's the engine noise level and touchy throttle, or if it really is that fast. I didn't have a chance to push it since I hit rush hour about 3 minutes after getting on the freeway.

Handling-wise, I didn't get a chance to really try her out, but it feels about the same as my M under normal driving. I guess what I'm saying is the M doesn't feel dynamically like a bigger car than the G35x under most normal driving conditions. Keep in mind that the G35x only has 17" rims with all-seasons while my M45 sport has 19" rims on summer tires.

Well this was my brief comparo between my M45 sport and G35x loaner. So after only a brief drive this morning (and later again this afternoon), does my M45 sport feel like it's worth $20k more than this G35x? I am going to have to reluctantly say "yes" to that. Had this been a better equipped G35x or a better equipped G35 sport my answer may be different, but considering the features that were missing from the loaner and the quality of materials and level of NVH (and this from the AWD model), "yes" is my answer and I'm sticking with it.

CGTSX2004

iTrader: (1)

Glad to see at least one other person in this world agrees with me that the aluminum in the G35 looks bad and that the throttle was annoyingly difficult to modulate smoothly.

dom

Nice review. According to Motor Trend Infiniti has/will recalibrate the throttle on 08's because of the sensitivity issue you mention. They couldn't stand it either on their Long Term G.

Garnet Canuck

Good honest review! As far as the throttle difficult to modulate, Infiniti has released a TSB for this. I haven't personally had it done since I like it touchy off the line, however others have stated that it did the trick.

mrdeeno

Anyone with a 2G CL or TL knows what the plastic-uminum shift gate surround looks like after 5+ years...all patterned up with little scratches and what not. The aluminum in the G35x looked like that, but I guess the difference is you don't have to worry about scratching it up since it would all blend in with the "pseudo" scratches anyway.

iTimmy

Nice review

A few things to consider, the throttle responiveness adjusts to the driver, if you drove it more it would adjust to you, however, its a loaner and cannot adjust to the driver because the drivers are constantly changing. I tend to drive fairly conservatively so its very easy to drive it smoothly with out the surge off the line, because I drive conservatively when I want to "get on her" its a little delayed, however the trans. shiftpoints change, it will hold a gear longer and downshifts upon hard braking. At first I hated the constant change, now I like it and if I want to punch it I just slide the tranny into "S" and its response is much greater.

Its funny you mention the exhaust being loud, I feel the same, though the bulk of the people on the infiniti forum would tend to disagree with us Not only is it fairly loud, it doesn't sound particularly good, very tinny and mechanical sounding.

I drove my friends M35X for a few hours, a few months ago and I was left with a very sour taste of the M in my mouth. Aside from more space(duh) and slightly higher quality interior I felt the G was a better fit for me. He is in his mid-late 40's, married with two kids, I am single, with no kids I know of.

RaviNJCLs

iTrader: (4)

Good job on the review.

I test drove the G35 and the G35X. I really liked the G35X. There are some of the features of the G35 that I just don't like, but all in all it's a very nice car.

Infamous425

ive driven an M35 sport for an hour and the new G for a couple hours. i agree with most of your points. the white/blue gauges in the G do look nice and im not a big fan of the orange lighting but the solar eclipse effect makes the M's gauges look just as cool.

except i like the real aluminum in the G and the more bare look. if im not mistaken the M doesnt even use real aluminum trim, thats disappointing to me. overall though the M's interior is of better quality/materials.

and the M sport has more lean on the turns and a softer suspension than the non sport G but thats no surprise.

and after having just seen the updated '08 M sport in person i'd say yes its worth the price difference.

AMGala

iTrader: (4)

I've never driven either car, but I have ridden in a G35X. It felt sporty from the passenger's seat. That said, I think the M looks much better than the G, so I'd probably prefer the M over the G.

mrdeeno

The M uses real aluminum (you really think they would put fake aluminum on a car that costs a lot more than one that uses real aluminum?). The reason I like the M's aluminum better is it has a dimpled/grid texture to it, but the pattern doesn't "wash" out the aluminum so it looks real. The only non-textured aluminum is the two "boomerangs", but these have no texture, so also look real, which they are. To me, the washi style makes the aluminum look dull (i guess "cloudy" would be a way to describe it), so it looks more like painted plastic, even though it's supposed to be real. I guess my point is the aluminum in the M looks like what it is supposed to be: Aluminum. The aluminum in the G looks like washi paper, and I really don't understand why they want ALUMINUM to look like washi PAPER instead of what it is. They should've just used washi paper overlayed on plastic if they wanted that look.

The M does have more body lean, which surprised me coming from a CL-S with comptech sways. The CL-S handled decent because it had little body lean with the sways, but the M handles better, even with more body lean, but that's just the dynamic differences between FWD and RWD. I didn't get a chance to push the G35x hard enough to see how the lean was, but there wasn't a noticable difference. I have no doubt the G35S would handle better considering its weight advantage and size, but the regular G35 and G35x, I can't say.

nokiaman

Thank you for taking the time to write this little yet effective review. I have driven the M45 in the past and I share the same views with almost everything. One thing I need to mention though, is the difference 20k made in the interior. I loved everything from dashboard ergonomics,steering wheel design speakers on the driver's seat etc. I was really impressed with the engine as well.What a sporty luxury vehicle. I'm almost certain I would take one over the ever popular 5 series.

I also took a test drive in the new G in the beginning of the year and I was impressed as well, you're very good at comparing both of these cars.


On a side note, you have a very nice home and a good selection of cee-cars

Secstac where are you?

mrdeeno

thanks, but that home is now sold and I live in a more modest home now near a bunch of retired old people who gossip about me because i have parties 'til 3am...but that's another story.

I canceled my verizon account when I moved, but I guess they don't empty out canceled accounts until they need the space or something.

I've only driven the M45 sport (briefly drove an M35x, but not enough to form any opinions), so maybe it's not really $20k more, because you can get everything except the engine in the M35 sport for less. But in that case I would have gotten an RL since those are going for bargain basement prices.

Infamous425

i thought it could've been fake because when i touched it/knocked on it it felt like plastic to me. maybe it was the dimples i dunno. i do like how it looks though.

nokiaman

F23A4

+1