2012 S60 and 2010 S60 - subtle differences

[345DL]

A couple of months ago, I replaced my July 2010 S60 SE D3 with a 2012 (2013 model year I think) S60 SE Lux D4. I thought I would post a little update about the tweaks I have discovered.

2010 Volvo S60 D3 SE, flame red:


2012 Volvo S60 D4 SE Lux, flame red:


Firstly, the most obvious difference is that the front grille has changed from black to a silvery grey, which I prefer. The font in which the 'S60' badge on the back is written has also changed, although I like the old typeface better.

The biggest changes are to the infotainment system, and every single one of my gripes with the old system have been addressed. For example, you can now search for music on the iPod by letter rather than scrolling through each entry until you get to what you want (which was a nightmare for letters in the middle of the alphabet!). The scrolling also speeds up the faster you scroll, whereas on the old system the speed remained one song/artist per click of the scroll. When you make or receive a telephone call, the music now pauses.

My old car had all the gadgets that the dealer demonstrators had, including city safety with auto-brake, BLIS, adaptive cruise control and front blind-view camera. I have to say, I don't really miss any of them, apart from maybe the BLIS on the passenger side when changing back to the slow or middle lane on a busy motorway. I guess I also miss the blind-view camera, but purely because my driveway has two tall hedges either side making it hard to see, but I could still have that installed by the dealer.

One new 'toy' that the 2012 car has is Start-Stop technology. I like it and it works well when the engine is warm and in warmer weather. However I find that when the engine is cold or the weather is particularly chilly, the engine will still cut out as soon as the car is stationary and gets into neutral, but will immediately start up again. Now I understand that clearly the car needs the engine to be on in those situations and presumably it has a computer to tell it to do so, but I find it very strange that that command is not processed until the one to switch the engine off has already happened. It seems very clumsy that the car is not able to work out that it shouldn't switch the engine off at all.

I do have a couple of issues with the new car. Firstly, the rear parking sensors do a couple of solid bleeps as soon as reverse is engaged, making one think that there is an obstruction directly behind. It then stops and behaves normally.

Also, the radio text seems to have a mind of its own, although I don't know whether this has anything to do with the car - I listen mainly to Radio 2 and the radio text displaying the current show or song playing is usually several hours out of date and is frozen on that readout. The strangest thing is that if I first get into my car at say 10am during Ken Bruce, the radio text sometimes says I'm listening to Vanessa Feltz (who finishes at 6:30). I'm guessing that this is a transmitter issue rather than my car, but it's been happening ever since I got it, throughout the country. Occasionally it fixes itself and displays up-to date text, but very rarely. Does anyone else have this issue?

And yes, I'm not very imaginative when it comes to car colours - this is my fourth dark red daily-driver Volvo (440, S40, S60, S60). Unfortunately, almost every other colour on offer this time was a shade of grey, which is just too dull to contemplate.

[craigv60]

Hi, my 2011 (MY2012) V60 D3 does exactly the same as yours with the start-stop (so I invariably disable it). I get the same with the radio text as well, it's nearly always out of date or not relevant. I suspect it's a broadcast issue.