I'll leave the detailed review to others like xEcks58 who have allready done a better job. This is just a few thoughts I had about my truck after a couple of days that I haven't seen elsewhere yet.
Suspension: I love the adjustable suspension and would recommend it if you tow. Toyota lowered the tow rating on the platinum nearly a thousand pounds with the adjustable suspension so maybe they aren't as confident in it's high load capability? Either way, in past vehicles with load leveling when you have a lot of tounge weight from a trailer, or just a cargo carrier on the receiver hitch the air springs increase the spring rate and without a corresponding increase in damping rate the rear end bounces around like you have blown shocks. Now I can just switch to sport mode which firms up the damping nicely to counteract the additional spring rate. It's definitely noticable in a good way.
Height adjustment: I'm not sure how useful it is in it's current form. It's slow, speed limited, and only has a tiny adjustment range. You can drop the rear up to 1" from normal, but as soon as you break 7mph it raises back to normal. You can raise the rear 1" over normal but as soon as you break 18mph it lowers to normal. Is this useful to anyone else? If I had a couple more inches of range it would be great as I could back up to my trailer and raise the ball right into the trailer hitch, that would be handy. It would also be much more useful if it changed the ride height on all four wheels like a land cruiser or range rover would, instead it's rear only. The manual says to not cross more than 20" deep water with the truck in normal height, but then says after raising the back one full inch you can cross 28" deep water. What kind of sense does that make? Typo maybe?
Drivetrain: Awesome. I'm not the first to say it and won't be the last. Very impressive. The ability to choose any gear to downshift too is a great feature when towing a trailer down long hills.
Nav: It's a decent unit, with very good sound but I'm very disappointed that it can't be used by passengers when driving. The whole dash is shifted a bit far to the passenger side of the vehicle, making it a long reach. I'm 6'2" and it's a stretch, I'd hate to think what it's like for the average woman who is 5'4"-5'6". They allready have a weight sensor in the passenger seat to inform the computer when to fire the airbags, they should have tied that same sensor into the nav unit and allowed it to operate when there is a passenger in the seat. This was definitely something I preferred on the Ford Expedition, the ability to define a new destination without pulling over on the side of the highway. I know they say it's a safety issue but I think it's much less of a safety issue (and apparently Ford agrees) to have your passenger type in a request for the nearest gas station than to pull over onto the shoulder of the road and risk getting a flat tire from all of the debris or being hit by a wandering driver.
Rear row seating: Very well done. I could fit in the Expedition, but I wouldn't be comfortable there for hours. The reclining option makes all of the difference. Forget about putting an adult in the back of a QX56, that thing is for children only.
Laser Cruise: I love it, wasn't sure if I would. The one flaw I find is they overestimate it's abilities. You still have the ability to use traditional non laser guided cruise which is nice since the standard cruise has speed adjustments of one mph and works even with the windshield wipers on. The laser cruise turns off when you hit low on the wipers, which makes sense as it probably doesn't work that well in heavy rain. The one problem I find with it is that the laser cruise only allows you to adjust speed in 5mph increments. I'm sure they thought this would be a nice feature as the laser should take care of the fine tuning but in practice I find that when I'm going 4-5mph faster than the car in front of me it runs up on their rear end, slows down 10-15mph with firm braking and beeping (giving everybody a scare), then accellerates briskly back up. As you hit small hills or turns it loses the car ahead, tries to speed up and is right back on their tail again slamming on the brakes. When I drive behind a car that is only going 1-2mph slower than me it works wonderfully. The obvious solution would be to lower the cruise a mph or two in order to more closely match the speed of the car I am following, but that isn't an option.
Memory seats: I'm in love! The remotes can be tied to the memory settings so if my girlfriend unlocks the truck with her remote the seat is in her position (setting 2) by the time she is in the truck and if I unlock it with my remote it's waiting in setting 1 for me. Very nice.
Customization: Another nice feature is the amount of customizing you can do without visiting the dealer now. The first thing I did was change the remote to unlock all doors with one click of the unlock button instead of only doing the drivers with the first click and all doors with the second click. There are all kinds of settings like this you can adjust, like how long the headlights stay on or when the doors should auto lock. I just wish I could adjust the mph increments on the laser cruise...
20" wheels: I'm not a fan, and may just trade someone out with the 18" wheels from a limited or SR5 if they want the big wheel look. As expected the truck rides great over larger bumps, but little ripples in the road are still felt as those are usually tuned out by the tire sidewalls as much as the suspension. It's too bad they force you to take the harsher riding wheels with the softer riding suspension, it's a bad combination in every day use but looks good on the showroom floor.
Air conditioned seats: I'm still torn on these. They are nice but I will probaby end up losing the heat/air conditioning features as I'll put seat covers on them. I use this as a truck, and tow a trailer with motorcycles almost every weekend. I will be getting in the truck with some dirt on my pants sooner or later and I'm afraid the dirt/mud will get in the holes in the seats.
Storaqe: Incredible. Just well thought out, little details like having the rear console flip forward so you can have captains chairs and a fold flat cargo area to sleep in or carry stuff. It's a tiny little detail but it sure puts a smile on my face.
Sun shades on rear windows: Another little detail that is really nice in practice. You can recline the seat, pull the sunshade and take a nap while someone drives you to the beach. They're also great when you're watching a dvd to keep the sun from causing glare on the screen and I leave them down pretty much constantly just to keep the sun off of the leather.
That's all for now. Let me know if you have any questions and I'll update this if anything else comes to mind.
-Shane
Suspension: I love the adjustable suspension and would recommend it if you tow. Toyota lowered the tow rating on the platinum nearly a thousand pounds with the adjustable suspension so maybe they aren't as confident in it's high load capability? Either way, in past vehicles with load leveling when you have a lot of tounge weight from a trailer, or just a cargo carrier on the receiver hitch the air springs increase the spring rate and without a corresponding increase in damping rate the rear end bounces around like you have blown shocks. Now I can just switch to sport mode which firms up the damping nicely to counteract the additional spring rate. It's definitely noticable in a good way.
Height adjustment: I'm not sure how useful it is in it's current form. It's slow, speed limited, and only has a tiny adjustment range. You can drop the rear up to 1" from normal, but as soon as you break 7mph it raises back to normal. You can raise the rear 1" over normal but as soon as you break 18mph it lowers to normal. Is this useful to anyone else? If I had a couple more inches of range it would be great as I could back up to my trailer and raise the ball right into the trailer hitch, that would be handy. It would also be much more useful if it changed the ride height on all four wheels like a land cruiser or range rover would, instead it's rear only. The manual says to not cross more than 20" deep water with the truck in normal height, but then says after raising the back one full inch you can cross 28" deep water. What kind of sense does that make? Typo maybe?
Drivetrain: Awesome. I'm not the first to say it and won't be the last. Very impressive. The ability to choose any gear to downshift too is a great feature when towing a trailer down long hills.
Nav: It's a decent unit, with very good sound but I'm very disappointed that it can't be used by passengers when driving. The whole dash is shifted a bit far to the passenger side of the vehicle, making it a long reach. I'm 6'2" and it's a stretch, I'd hate to think what it's like for the average woman who is 5'4"-5'6". They allready have a weight sensor in the passenger seat to inform the computer when to fire the airbags, they should have tied that same sensor into the nav unit and allowed it to operate when there is a passenger in the seat. This was definitely something I preferred on the Ford Expedition, the ability to define a new destination without pulling over on the side of the highway. I know they say it's a safety issue but I think it's much less of a safety issue (and apparently Ford agrees) to have your passenger type in a request for the nearest gas station than to pull over onto the shoulder of the road and risk getting a flat tire from all of the debris or being hit by a wandering driver.
Rear row seating: Very well done. I could fit in the Expedition, but I wouldn't be comfortable there for hours. The reclining option makes all of the difference. Forget about putting an adult in the back of a QX56, that thing is for children only.
Laser Cruise: I love it, wasn't sure if I would. The one flaw I find is they overestimate it's abilities. You still have the ability to use traditional non laser guided cruise which is nice since the standard cruise has speed adjustments of one mph and works even with the windshield wipers on. The laser cruise turns off when you hit low on the wipers, which makes sense as it probably doesn't work that well in heavy rain. The one problem I find with it is that the laser cruise only allows you to adjust speed in 5mph increments. I'm sure they thought this would be a nice feature as the laser should take care of the fine tuning but in practice I find that when I'm going 4-5mph faster than the car in front of me it runs up on their rear end, slows down 10-15mph with firm braking and beeping (giving everybody a scare), then accellerates briskly back up. As you hit small hills or turns it loses the car ahead, tries to speed up and is right back on their tail again slamming on the brakes. When I drive behind a car that is only going 1-2mph slower than me it works wonderfully. The obvious solution would be to lower the cruise a mph or two in order to more closely match the speed of the car I am following, but that isn't an option.
Memory seats: I'm in love! The remotes can be tied to the memory settings so if my girlfriend unlocks the truck with her remote the seat is in her position (setting 2) by the time she is in the truck and if I unlock it with my remote it's waiting in setting 1 for me. Very nice.
Customization: Another nice feature is the amount of customizing you can do without visiting the dealer now. The first thing I did was change the remote to unlock all doors with one click of the unlock button instead of only doing the drivers with the first click and all doors with the second click. There are all kinds of settings like this you can adjust, like how long the headlights stay on or when the doors should auto lock. I just wish I could adjust the mph increments on the laser cruise...
20" wheels: I'm not a fan, and may just trade someone out with the 18" wheels from a limited or SR5 if they want the big wheel look. As expected the truck rides great over larger bumps, but little ripples in the road are still felt as those are usually tuned out by the tire sidewalls as much as the suspension. It's too bad they force you to take the harsher riding wheels with the softer riding suspension, it's a bad combination in every day use but looks good on the showroom floor.
Air conditioned seats: I'm still torn on these. They are nice but I will probaby end up losing the heat/air conditioning features as I'll put seat covers on them. I use this as a truck, and tow a trailer with motorcycles almost every weekend. I will be getting in the truck with some dirt on my pants sooner or later and I'm afraid the dirt/mud will get in the holes in the seats.
Storaqe: Incredible. Just well thought out, little details like having the rear console flip forward so you can have captains chairs and a fold flat cargo area to sleep in or carry stuff. It's a tiny little detail but it sure puts a smile on my face.
Sun shades on rear windows: Another little detail that is really nice in practice. You can recline the seat, pull the sunshade and take a nap while someone drives you to the beach. They're also great when you're watching a dvd to keep the sun from causing glare on the screen and I leave them down pretty much constantly just to keep the sun off of the leather.
That's all for now. Let me know if you have any questions and I'll update this if anything else comes to mind.
-Shane