Yeah, I’ve chosen smartphone integration (mostly as I’d regret it if I decided I couldn’t live without it) Heated steering wheel, would rather I didn’t need to get the rear heated seats too I’d add that the inscription pro seems to have the equivalent of the matrix headlights though. I was hoping to get adaptive cruise control, but as I’ve not had it on the Ford decided moving to an automatic from manual will give me a big benefit anyway. Also decided I didn’t need keyless entry, as very rarely use it in the Ford. Though extras can add to the cost substantially as you’ve pointed out ?
Gary – The headlights on the Volvo aren’t comparable to fully adaptive matrix headlights. From the info that I have read they are LED lights that ‘bend’. I’ve had those on a car some years ago and they turn the throw of the beam left or right depending on steering input. Adaptive Matrix headlights are a much newer generation of technology and they do an awful lot of very clever things depending on the road, speed etc. Most beneficial is the ability to drive on full beam with the headlight automatically ‘cutting out’ oncoming vehicles, or vehicles that are ahead of you, whilst leaving the rest of the beam on full. As the vehicle passes (or turns off) the section of the beam that has been cut out fills back in again as if by magic. They are absolutely brilliant and have to be experienced to be believed. The system used by VW isn’t as good as the one used by BMW (the BMW system reacts instantly where there is a bit of a lag on the VW system – a bit like their auto transmissions!) and the fact that you can’t even get them as an option on the XC40 was one of the reasons that the Volvo dropped into second place for us when we were choosing recently.