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(Telecompaper) UK ISP Fusion Fibre Group has partnered with Platform X Communications (PXC), wholesale network division of TalkTalk Telecom Group, to expand its UK network coverage...

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(Telecompaper) France's leading TV channel TF1 said that viewers of its TF1+ streaming service can now access over 2,000 hours of additional content following a distribution partnership with Franco-German TV network Arte. As part of the agreement, the entire offering within the Arte.tv platform will be available...

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I currently drive a BMW X5, and I’m looking to upgrade to the Mercedes-Benz EQS SUV or the Range Rover Sport. What would you recommend?

Suraj M, Gurugram

Autocar India says: If you mainly drive within the city with the odd weekend outing, the EQS SUV is a good choice. It’s smoother and faster, has a futuristic interior and is far more refined than the Range Rover Sport. If you are planning to do a lot of highway driving, then the RR Sport is better. It also has a better back seat and more legroom than the EQS SUV. 

Also See:

New Range Rover Sport video review

New Range Rover Sport review: More than just good looks

Mercedes EQS SUV review: High on EQ

Mercedes EQS SUV video review

With the Suzuki V-Strom SX having left our fleet, I was without a long-termer for my daily commute to the office. As luck would have it though, Dinshaw, who was the custodian of our long-term Bajaj Pulsar N250, was set to go on a lengthy leave. So I was more than glad to grab the keys and draft it in as my V-Strom replacement. At least for the time being, is what I told my colleague.

But over the last few months, I’ve really grown to like the N250, so much so that Dinshaw has had to resort to using one of our other long-termers. Jumping off the Suzuki, the Bajaj feels compact and much more manageable in traffic, which is a boon. A special shoutout has to go to the superb headlight of the Pulsar; it’s a better and more effective unit than I’ve experienced on many bigger and more expensive bikes. The Pulsar also dealt with one of the longest monsoon seasons in recent memory with ease. There’s barely any rusting to speak of, apart from some small bolts, and even the plastic and rubber parts have held up well.

While our Pulsar N250 has been largely reserved for commuting, I did take it on a brief spin out on the highway and that shed light on a few things. Firstly, this 250cc mill is superbly refined with barely any vibrations at 90-95kph cruising speeds, which takes some fatigue out of riding for a long time. On the flipside though, I found the seat cushioning to be too hard. Granted, I don’t have the most padded posterior around, but even so, I’ve been finding it too uncomfortable leading me to move around on the seat every couple of minutes to ease some of the pain.

But a major reason for why it’s been hard to handover the keys of the Pulsar has been the superb fuel economy. With my regular commute and this brief highway stint taken into account, the Pulsar N250 managed an eye-opening 500km+ on a single tank. And it goes without saying that it has not all been sedate riding. I’ve genuinely been impressed with the N250’s balance of performance and efficiency.

However, as time has gone on, some issues have begun to creep in. The smaller issue is that one of the reflectors on the front fork came loose and fell off. It is held on by just an adhesive strip and I’m sure there are better ways to keep it secure. The bigger issue, however, has been with the front brake. When riding at low speeds, it feels like the brake pads are rubbing against the disc in an unusual manner even without the lever being pressed, almost as if the disc is warped. When I took over the bike this was barely noticeable, but it has grown as our time with the bike has progressed. The Pulsar is now off for its service and a check-up. More on the service costs and the front brake issue in the next report.

After having run wonderfully well for nearly its entire duration with us, the Ather 450X Gen 3 is unfortunately returning to its maker on the back of a flatbed, having thrown up a rather unusual glitch at the end of its tenure. As described in our previous report, the scooter downloads and installs updates overnight, but only completes the process the next time you turn the scooter on. Having returned from 10 days outside the country, I turned the Ather’s key on to be greeted with a message about the scooter completing an update. However, after remaining on this screen for about 5 minutes, the scooter then delivered a message saying that the update could not be completed, following which the TFT display showed the regular home screen.

When trying to put the scooter into a forward riding mode, it refused to cooperate. The process to start riding involves simultaneously pressing a brake lever and the starter button. But even after doing this, the scooter remains in Park mode, and keeps flashing a message saying “Press Brake + Start”. Neither a hard reset nor a full shutdown and restart has been able to rectify this issue. And an attempt to reinstall the latest update was thwarted by the fact that the Ather Connect subscription for our scooter has expired, removing many of the TFT screen’s features, including OTA updates. Speaking to the company, we are told that the glitch has been caused by the fact that the Ather Connect subscription has expired.

Ultimately, this experience serves as a prudent reminder. All the smart and connected tech that’s being showered on e-scooters these days certainly brings in a great deal of convenience and security. But at the same time, it also brings with it increased complexity, and the potential for software errors and glitches like this to present themselves. In extreme cases, these can prove to be a serious safety issue, as we’ve seen with the Ola S1 Pro – going backwards while being in a forward riding mode and vice versa. And in less severe (but still quite upsetting) cases like on the Ather, they can leave you and your vehicle stranded, even though its battery is full of juice.

For the most part, the 450X’s software package has proven to be one of the more robust and bug-free systems around, but clearly, even the best in the business is not entirely free from flaws. Software glitch aside, the 450X has proven to be an excellent companion on daily commutes. Its combination of zippy performance, extremely accurate range predictions and a slick user experience have been an absolute delight. Many of these highlights are also present on the more recent and more affordable 450S, but that scooter removes some of the excess complexity by sporting a simpler LCD screen in place of the TFT. It will be joining our long-term fleet soon, so stay tuned for a detailed account of how that scooter fares in the long run.

Our long-term Super Meteor hasn’t had a proper custodian in a few months and with a 4,000-odd km tour to the South coming up, I decided to grab the keys and give this bike a proper send-off from our long-term garage. Before this, I hadn’t spent proper seat time aboard the Super Meteor, and ever since it had entered our fleet, I’d always wanted to take it for a long road trip.

Even before I’d clocked a single kilometre on this ride, I was smitten by how good this bike looks. And it’s an opinion the general public seems to share. From the large teardrop-shaped fuel tank, that swooping rear fender and those chrome exhaust header pipes, this bike is a looker. There were some much larger and way more expensive bikes with me on the trip but even when parked next to those machines, the Super Meteor always had people swarming around it.

Those textbook good looks do come at a price though. Due to that long, low-slung silhouette that the Super Meteor cuts, suspension travel at the rear is quite limited. And it is set up quite stiff, which means that you feel every little bump on the road. It’s not as bad as some other Chinese cruisers at this price point, but it’s not a very pleasant ride either. What makes matters worse is that sofa-like feet-forward riding position, which means your back bears the brunt of all the abuse Indian roads subject the bike to. And when you inevitably encounter a mountainous speedbreaker on the road, you need to slow down to a halt and negotiate it carefully due to the limited ground clearance on offer.

To its credit, the Super Meteor only scraped its belly twice over the multitude of speed breakers I came across and that could be due to the fact that I had loaded the bike up with luggage, plus 80kg me. 

Thankfully, that sweet 648cc parallel-twin mill diverts your mind from all these shortcomings as soon as you twist the throttle. There’s no sudden surge like on a KTM 390 Duke (my personal bike that I usually tour on), but there’s strong pull available at fairly low revs in just about any gear. 100kph in sixth gear is effortless and if you choose to venture beyond that threshold, this engine will be a willing companion along with a sweet soundtrack to accompany it. Fuel economy while cruising at triple-digit speeds constantly ranged in the early to mid-20s for me.

If you’ve done any amount of touring you’ll know that an engine that just makes power isn’t everything; refinement is equally important. And I’m pleased to report that the Super Meteor has fared exceptionally well in this regard. What did annoy me on those long days was the fuel gauge that had a mind of its own once it dropped below the halfway point. In fact, if you put the bike on the side stand, the fuel level would climb back up and stay there for a good 5-10 minutes once you start riding, and then drop back down at an alarmingly quick rate. On a bike that’s got some proper mile-munching capabilities, fixing this niggle would go a long way.

The last service we did was a pretty comprehensive one as I wanted to make sure everything was shipshape before such a long ride. The total was Rs 10,351 which seems a little steep, and more than half of that amount (Rs 5,900) went towards replacing the front and rear brake pads. This is something to keep in mind because our bike had only done 4,000km when we got it serviced and the pads were nearly worn out.

In our nine months with it, there have been no worrying issues with the bike. It has held up largely well but there is a bit of oxidation on the engine casing and the triple clamp has also started to rust. However, our bike was parked outside through the monsoon so I suppose this may not have happened if the bike had sheltered parking.

Barring these issues, the Super Meteor 650 has been faultless and I have to say I’ll be quite dejected to see it go. However, the silver lining to this proverbial dark cloud is that we will quite possibly be swapping the Super Meteor for the new Himalayan, and that is one new Royal Enfield I believe will be a serious contender in the sub-Rs 4 lakh ADV tourer category. An exciting year up ahead indeed!

Also see:

Royal Enfield Super Meteor 650 long term review, 3500km report

Royal Enfield Super Meteor 650 long term review, 1180km report

It’s been a few months since our last report on the Xpulse 4V and the odometer has nearly doubled in that time. Most of the miles were down to regular trips to and from Pune, but there was also some off-roading and regular commuting thrown in.

Mostly though, the bike went through a full monsoon with it being parked out in the rain for some long periods. That did take a toll and we had to have the switchgear replaced after it stopped functioning properly.

The rainy season also proved to be a bit too much for the Reise tyres we installed earlier this year. The 50/50 tyres were superb off-road and on-road  grip levels were decent in the dry as well, although the tyres did ‘feel’ quite strange in how quickly the bike fell into lean compared with normal road tyres. However, the combination of rain as well as Mumbai’s atrocious slippery concrete roads resulted in a fairly uneasy, skittish experience.

In fact, the bike did get involved in an accident on the road, but instead of poor grip, it was down to a poorly driven rickshaw that decided to swing across a multi-lane road at the last minute without any indication whatsoever. While that resulted in a broken bone for my unfortunate colleague, the Xpulse took the impact remarkably well.

The engine guard has always annoyed me off-road because it gets in the way when you’re sticking your leg forward, but it did a good job in this instance. The guard got bent but took the brunt of the impact and kept the bike safe.

In that sense, the Xpulse does feel quite robust in general, but quality levels are a bit basic. Things have improved over the years, but you can understand how Hero has always managed to price this 200cc dual sport close to 160cc street bikes. The paint quality could be nicer and our windscreen also developed a rattle, which began before the accident.

In terms of reliability, things have been decent, but not completely incident-free. In our last report, we mentioned how the bike refused to start, which was diagnosed to be a faulty lockset that needed replacing. Since then, the clutch started to throw up issues and it felt like there was no clear bite point, which made things tricky in traffic. After a few visits to the workshop, this was diagnosed as an issue with ‘spring activation’.

Overall, the Xpulse has been an enjoyable all-rounder that has managed to be a frugal commuter as well as a fun off-roader. The nicest aspect was its simplicity and lightweight – the latter is something that becomes all the more apparent when you ride the big, new Himalayan 450. Sure, the Hero can’t come anywhere close to the Himalayan in most respects, but it’s a lightweight, affordable and cheerful motorcycle, and there will always be takers for such a machine. It will be missed.

Also See:

Hero Xpulse 200 4V long term review, third report

The motorcycle you see here came fresh from the showroom with just a handful of kilometres on the clock and we’ve already passed the 1,000km mark. Most of that has been within the city as the bike eats through my near-70km round trip commute to work with effortless ease. 

On most motorcycles, the one-way journey usually takes 50-55 minutes on a good day, but the Himalayan has sliced that down to about 45-50 minutes. It’s not like I’m going any faster than I normally would, but I just don’t have to slow down that much over the bad patches.

The Himalayan’s superb suspension along with its composed chassis and comfy riding position help it plough through broken stretches without a care, and that’s a beautiful feeling if you live somewhere with terrible roads. 

This is a big bike, there’s no getting around that. Shorter or less experienced riders will find it a bit intimidating and you do feel the heft when lifting it off the side stand. But in a market where approachability and friendliness is pretty much the norm, it’s refreshing to have the option of a proper, large motorcycle. Besides which, I find the size and heft is completely justified given the bike’s comfort, capability and large fuel tank. 

In traffic, the steering requires less effort than you’d expect and that makes filtering through tight gaps quite easy. I recently got to ride my brother’s 390 Adventure across the city with him riding the Himalayan. After an hour and a half, it was apparent that the rider on the Himalayan has to work less and feels less fatigue as well thanks to the suspension, seating position and mid-range torque. In comparison, the KTM is noticeably more sporty and lighter feeling, (both in general and in terms of clutch weight). It was also more rewarding when revved out but I was happy to be back on the Himalayan after the ride.

Reliability so far has been spot on. The bike starts without hassle, has never stalled or done anything weird and the fuel gauge is delightfully accurate – something RE’s other bikes could definitely learn from. I’ve been getting around 25kpl in the city with plenty of spirited riding and with that big 17-litre tank, highway range is very good.

The Himalayan’s first service is due at the 500km mark, at which point the service centre gives the bike a general check-up and changes the engine oil. The cost came up to Rs 3,062, of which Rs 2,415 was towards 2.1 litres of semi-synthetic 10W-40 engine oil. The rest included Rs 250 towards a “first service kit”, Rs 118 towards “consumable charges” and Rs 279 towards a chain lube and cleaning kit. 

That essentially sums up life with the Himalayan so far and it’s been a good time. I’d like to be able to do some off-road riding before this pleasant Mumbai winter weather burns away and maybe get a few choice accessories installed as well. More will be shared in the next report.

The time has come for our long-term Bajaj Pulsar N250 to return to its maker and it will be missed. Partly because it leaves me without a bike to commute to and from the office, and I now have to drive or take the train; both of which I find tedious. But it’s mostly because of how good a package it actually is.

For starters, I really like the design and the black paint with red accents on our bike has grown on me. Ours is the dual-channel, ABS-equipped version, which can only be had in this scheme. This may not be to everyone’s taste, so perhaps Bajaj should look into offering more colours. Another thing I grew to appreciate was the digi-analogue cluster. The big analogue tacho that takes centre stage looks really nice and I love the way it does an end-to-end sweep whenever you twist the key on. The digital screen, however, is a little too small for the amount of info it packs in. However, Bajaj will soon launch an updated model with a fully digital display.

Fuel efficiency has also been a big plus. I’ve been averaging around 36kpl in varied conditions and not all of it has been with a light twist of the wrist. The silky motor has enough pep and it sounds good too. Finally, the light clutch and comfy suspension also meant that it dealt with Mumbai’s broken and jam-packed roads with ease. 

Some of the things that were not so nice were its hard seat, the low-set handlebar and some minor oxidation on the bolts of the handlebar clamp. Now, let’s come to the issue with the front disc that, unfortunately, became the main talking point in its last few weeks with us.

Upon the issue worsening a couple of months into our tenure, the bike went to the Bajaj service centre for inspection. They got back saying the issue was with the brake pads as they weren’t set correctly and that it has been rectified. However, the problem crept up again within a day. After another visit to the service centre yielded similar results, the bike went back to Bajaj for inspection. And it was there where our original suspicion was confirmed; the N250 did, in fact, have a warped disc.

This doesn’t seem to be a known issue and as the bike had never been dropped or crashed, the only plausible explanation was a manufacturing defect. The front disc (Rs 2,242) was then replaced and the bike was returned to us. Ever since, the Pulsar N250 was working just fine till it left our fleet. Bajaj tells us that the disc will be replaced under warranty, as long as the brake pad wear is within defined limits. 

Our time with the Pulsar N250 was mostly spent commuting in the city and that’s where it feels at home. Sure, it can tour if you want it to, it just won’t be very enjoyable because there isn’t much high-speed performance. On the whole, I’ve really liked the time I’ve spent on the N250 and if you are looking at a sporty motorcycle that’s relatively comfy, looks good and is light on your wallet, this one is worth considering.

Also See:

Bajaj Pulsar N250 long term review, 730km report

Bajaj Pulsar N250 long term review, 2000km report