OneFunGenesis
<- Runnin' on Empty
Happy new year fellow Genesis enthusiasts! I will be giving a full review here of the Kia K900 Luxury with VIP package. I will let you know that I am not going anywhere! I will stay here and continue to be a part of this forum, I love you guys.
So this review is for a 2015 Kia K900 Luxury with VIP package. This car is "loaded" and has a sticker of $66,800 roughly.
Table of Contents:
Buying Experience:
This is dealer dependent, but only "authorized" K900 dealers that do a certain level of business are allowed to sell the K900. So my closest Kia dealership cannot sell the K900 while the one 20 mins away, can. The process was actually quite simple. Just some paperwork and about 20 mins of a guy trying to teach me the interior features. I arrived at the dealership at 9:45 am and walked out at 10:50. That isn't too bad at all.
For reference about how this could have gone, in the 2 years or production, this dealership has sold 6 Kia K900's.
Exterior Styling/Features:
This car stands out among the crowd. It is BIG. I mean truly big.
The Front:
The front end is a little bullish but has LED fog lights, quad LED projector headlights and quad LED projector high beams. There are LED DRL strips on the front of her as well. This is also accompanied with a forward facing camera for help with parking. There is also a well hidden panel for the SCC and front collision mitigation system. There is also a camera mounted above the rear view mirror for the LDWS (more on this in the comparison section).
The Side:
You finally realize that the car is long. Long nose, long tail, broad sides. 4 doors, 4 windows, not a ton to look at. Side mirrors auto fold when the car locks and when you approach the car, the mirrors fold out and puddle lights come on. There is also blind spot detection integrated into the mirrors.
The Rear:
Its an LS460. It stole the tail lights almost exactly. There is a rear camera (obviously lol) and a trunk latch. The trunk is automated. Hit the button and the trunk will raise completely. In the trunk is a ginormous battery and a spare that is still not full size...weird. There is also a hook for groceries that I have already used. Looking at the back you can see integrated exhaust, the K900 name plate and the giant "V8" in the right hand corner.
Interior Styling:
This thing is beautiful. The seats are still soft. The lumbar support is awesome. There is a front facing camera that activates for parking, side cameras, and rear camera for birds eye view while you back up. There is blind spot monitoring, lane departure warning, speed sensitive cruise control which are all displayed on the heads up display. There is auto hold and heated steering wheel and the shifter straight out of the BMW 5 series and up. There are also heated and cooled, with memory, front an rear seats. Auto climate control and the same DIS system that we are used to in the tech package Genesis. The rear passengers have sun shades on the side and rear windows (including the quarter windows) that they are able to control. They have heated and cooled reclining seats and the back passenger side ride-along can control the front passenger seat when it is not occupied to give more room and visibility. There are also separate lumbar and climate controls in the rear.
Tech:
The real tech comes in the things you can control within the car. There are drive modes (I will talk about this in the next section) the heads up display, and the instrument cluster. On the heads up display you can customize how high or low it is. The color, the size, what it displays (I currently have it showing speed, Blind spot detection, Lane departure warning, and navigation headings). You can also customize the instrument cluster. The size of the speedo, the "theme" of modern or retro. The doors also have auto soft close if you dont close the doors the full way.
Oh, it also has the credit card smart key
Comfort and Performance:
This car is beyond comfortable. My wife drove it while I worked in the back of the car for a little while and it was a pleasure. Road bumps are absorbed flawlessly and it feel like gliding on a cloud. I will love this for the weekends I put 1000 miles on it because of how comfortable it is. I was a little worried about the comfort aspect because of the "low profile" 45 series tires on it front and rear but this is moot at this point.
Performance:
So, this car has the 5.0 GDI v8 like we all know and love. It is also mated to the 8 speed tranny that we all know, but some dont love. This car is considerably slower than my 4.6 Genesis. I attribute this to the close ratio 8 speed as well as the extra 400 lbs I am carrying around. Gross weight of the vehicle is 5,9xx lbs. The car is planted to the road with 245/45/19's in the front and 275/45/19's in the rear. Easily plants itself to the road and is very comfortable and sufficiently fast.
There are 4 drive modes for the car. Normal, sport, snow, and eco.
Normal is normal. Nothing special happening here.
Sport puts the car into sport mode. It stiffens the suspension, changes the speedo and tach into giant numbers you can easily read and changes the trans shift points.
Snow mode is just a considerably less powerful eco with shift points starting higher (into a higher gear quicker) to help with snow traction.
Eco changes the shift points and engine characteristics to get the best fuel economy possible.
Fuel Economy is almost the exact same as the 4.6. It is listed as 18/23. I am hoping to see more in the 22MPG combined range and getting close to 30 on the highway like I did with the 4.6.
Similarities/Differences to the Genesis:
This relates much more tho the 2015 Genesis than the 2009. It has most (plus more) of the Genesis ultimate sedan features. It also has some very similar drawbacks. The LDWS is annoying as hell around the back roads. It is much better on the highway. BSD (blind spot detection) is somewhat annoying as well but does not make a sound...which is nice. The interior still feels a touch cheap with the plastics that are being used. The sound dampening is considerably better than the genesis and the comfort of the ride is leaps and bounds above the genesis.
My Experiences so Far:
I have put about 100 miles on her just in yesterday. The comfort is awesome, the power is smooth and silent and the headlights are so much better than the Genesis I had...I can actually see! lol. I am still finding little things in the car that I can activate and play with. This is the first time I have had a heated steering wheel so that is taking some getting used to. The bluetooth phone finally downloads all of my contacts and I can dial by their name. The car is extremely spacious. Even being built on the Equus platform, this car feels bigger from the front and rear. Speed sensitive cruise will take some getting used to as that is still a little harry for me but all in all, I love this car!
Purchase Details:
I got this 2015 on 12/31/2015 as a lease. $2,000 down and $393.77 per month for 24 months with 12k miles per year. Payout will be about $35k when it comes to the 24th month.
Thanks for taking the time to read this guys. Please ask any questions that I may have left out and I will answer them as I can.
OneFunGenesis
EDIT: Update one. So, it seems the drive mode and auto hold does not remember its setting when turning the car off...same as the 2015 Genesis. So that is a pretty annoying feature. Heated steering wheel remembers if it was on or off. So, fun stuff there lol
Update two: The headlights were at different heights. So I adjusted them tonight and now they are both even up. Stay tuned for more
So this review is for a 2015 Kia K900 Luxury with VIP package. This car is "loaded" and has a sticker of $66,800 roughly.
Table of Contents:
- Buying Experience
- Exterior Styling/Features
- Interior Styling/Features
- Comfort/Performance
- Similarities and Differences to the Genesis
- My Thoughts/Experience
Buying Experience:
This is dealer dependent, but only "authorized" K900 dealers that do a certain level of business are allowed to sell the K900. So my closest Kia dealership cannot sell the K900 while the one 20 mins away, can. The process was actually quite simple. Just some paperwork and about 20 mins of a guy trying to teach me the interior features. I arrived at the dealership at 9:45 am and walked out at 10:50. That isn't too bad at all.
For reference about how this could have gone, in the 2 years or production, this dealership has sold 6 Kia K900's.
Exterior Styling/Features:
This car stands out among the crowd. It is BIG. I mean truly big.
The Front:
The front end is a little bullish but has LED fog lights, quad LED projector headlights and quad LED projector high beams. There are LED DRL strips on the front of her as well. This is also accompanied with a forward facing camera for help with parking. There is also a well hidden panel for the SCC and front collision mitigation system. There is also a camera mounted above the rear view mirror for the LDWS (more on this in the comparison section).
The Side:
You finally realize that the car is long. Long nose, long tail, broad sides. 4 doors, 4 windows, not a ton to look at. Side mirrors auto fold when the car locks and when you approach the car, the mirrors fold out and puddle lights come on. There is also blind spot detection integrated into the mirrors.
The Rear:
Its an LS460. It stole the tail lights almost exactly. There is a rear camera (obviously lol) and a trunk latch. The trunk is automated. Hit the button and the trunk will raise completely. In the trunk is a ginormous battery and a spare that is still not full size...weird. There is also a hook for groceries that I have already used. Looking at the back you can see integrated exhaust, the K900 name plate and the giant "V8" in the right hand corner.
Interior Styling:
This thing is beautiful. The seats are still soft. The lumbar support is awesome. There is a front facing camera that activates for parking, side cameras, and rear camera for birds eye view while you back up. There is blind spot monitoring, lane departure warning, speed sensitive cruise control which are all displayed on the heads up display. There is auto hold and heated steering wheel and the shifter straight out of the BMW 5 series and up. There are also heated and cooled, with memory, front an rear seats. Auto climate control and the same DIS system that we are used to in the tech package Genesis. The rear passengers have sun shades on the side and rear windows (including the quarter windows) that they are able to control. They have heated and cooled reclining seats and the back passenger side ride-along can control the front passenger seat when it is not occupied to give more room and visibility. There are also separate lumbar and climate controls in the rear.
Tech:
The real tech comes in the things you can control within the car. There are drive modes (I will talk about this in the next section) the heads up display, and the instrument cluster. On the heads up display you can customize how high or low it is. The color, the size, what it displays (I currently have it showing speed, Blind spot detection, Lane departure warning, and navigation headings). You can also customize the instrument cluster. The size of the speedo, the "theme" of modern or retro. The doors also have auto soft close if you dont close the doors the full way.
Oh, it also has the credit card smart key
Comfort and Performance:
This car is beyond comfortable. My wife drove it while I worked in the back of the car for a little while and it was a pleasure. Road bumps are absorbed flawlessly and it feel like gliding on a cloud. I will love this for the weekends I put 1000 miles on it because of how comfortable it is. I was a little worried about the comfort aspect because of the "low profile" 45 series tires on it front and rear but this is moot at this point.
Performance:
So, this car has the 5.0 GDI v8 like we all know and love. It is also mated to the 8 speed tranny that we all know, but some dont love. This car is considerably slower than my 4.6 Genesis. I attribute this to the close ratio 8 speed as well as the extra 400 lbs I am carrying around. Gross weight of the vehicle is 5,9xx lbs. The car is planted to the road with 245/45/19's in the front and 275/45/19's in the rear. Easily plants itself to the road and is very comfortable and sufficiently fast.
There are 4 drive modes for the car. Normal, sport, snow, and eco.
Normal is normal. Nothing special happening here.
Sport puts the car into sport mode. It stiffens the suspension, changes the speedo and tach into giant numbers you can easily read and changes the trans shift points.
Snow mode is just a considerably less powerful eco with shift points starting higher (into a higher gear quicker) to help with snow traction.
Eco changes the shift points and engine characteristics to get the best fuel economy possible.
Fuel Economy is almost the exact same as the 4.6. It is listed as 18/23. I am hoping to see more in the 22MPG combined range and getting close to 30 on the highway like I did with the 4.6.
Similarities/Differences to the Genesis:
This relates much more tho the 2015 Genesis than the 2009. It has most (plus more) of the Genesis ultimate sedan features. It also has some very similar drawbacks. The LDWS is annoying as hell around the back roads. It is much better on the highway. BSD (blind spot detection) is somewhat annoying as well but does not make a sound...which is nice. The interior still feels a touch cheap with the plastics that are being used. The sound dampening is considerably better than the genesis and the comfort of the ride is leaps and bounds above the genesis.
My Experiences so Far:
I have put about 100 miles on her just in yesterday. The comfort is awesome, the power is smooth and silent and the headlights are so much better than the Genesis I had...I can actually see! lol. I am still finding little things in the car that I can activate and play with. This is the first time I have had a heated steering wheel so that is taking some getting used to. The bluetooth phone finally downloads all of my contacts and I can dial by their name. The car is extremely spacious. Even being built on the Equus platform, this car feels bigger from the front and rear. Speed sensitive cruise will take some getting used to as that is still a little harry for me but all in all, I love this car!
Purchase Details:
I got this 2015 on 12/31/2015 as a lease. $2,000 down and $393.77 per month for 24 months with 12k miles per year. Payout will be about $35k when it comes to the 24th month.
Thanks for taking the time to read this guys. Please ask any questions that I may have left out and I will answer them as I can.
OneFunGenesis
EDIT: Update one. So, it seems the drive mode and auto hold does not remember its setting when turning the car off...same as the 2015 Genesis. So that is a pretty annoying feature. Heated steering wheel remembers if it was on or off. So, fun stuff there lol
Update two: The headlights were at different heights. So I adjusted them tonight and now they are both even up. Stay tuned for more
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