A 2014 Nissan Rogue will impress you with its suite of driver assistance tools and connectivity options. Add in an upscale cockpit and the Rogue moves close to the head of the class of sub-$30,000 crossover utility vehicles (CUVs).
To get all the safety tech you want, you need to buy the costliest of the three Rogue trim lines, and even then the Rogue lacks the adaptive cruise control and collision avoidance features of the well-regarded but less luxurious Subaru Forester crossover. Instead, Nissan offers sensors that detect children and pets moving around near the car and electronic aids to help you go around corners, smooth out bumps, and brake smoothly.
The application I tried worked well, although some were a little balky and then came to life. (This in the very first production models. The Rogue goes on sale November 13.) For full robustness on iOS devices, they need to be USB-tethered.
Here’s how Pandora works: Without NissanConnect, you start Pandora playing on the phone, stream it over Bluetooth or a line-in jack, and control music with the phone. With NissanConnect, all that is handled by the center stack or steering wheel buttons.
