2009 Maserati Quattroporte

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Interior - What the Auto Press Says

The 2009 Maserati Quattroporte is remarkable for the extent to which the automaker will customize the vehicle. Ten colors of leather upholstery, 11 of leather piping and several exotic wood trims are offered. A new electronics interface is considered an improvement over last year's button-heavy console, but some reviewers still experienced problems with it.

• "For 2009, Maserati made minor but significant changes to the Quattroporte's interior, which we've always loved for its sumptuousness but not for its ergonomics. ... Covered with hectares of gooey-soft leather, so-genuine-it-looks-fake wood, and Alcantara, the Quattroporte cabin remains the olfactory and tactile feast it's always been." -- Car and Driver
• "There are extensive customization options for the finely crafted interior, and the new Bose multimedia integration and navigation system is a vast improvement from the car's earlier center-stack layout. The Maserati Quattroporte's cabin can be customized like few other production vehicles at its price point, offering a vast array of cabin trims and leather colors. Want a hideous combo of Cuiuo burnt orange and Bordeaux red? Maserati will set you up." - Edmunds
• " Other interior upgrades include new cluster graphics, reshaped seats and a new multifunction wood and leather steering wheel with sporty thumb rests." -- Motor Trend

Seating

The Quattroporte is configured to seat four adults in comfort, though some reviewers say that taller people may find the headroom limited at all four seating positions. All four seats are power-adjustable and upholstered in luxurious Italian leather.

• " The seats feature new stitch patterns and are firmer on the edges than in the insets. Some of us found them to be a touch wide in the lumbar region, and we were further irked by strange electronic clicking sounds coming from the seats, which we surmise had to do with the massage function. Ultimately, neither could detract from the sheer decadence of the cockpit and the ideal positioning of the driver." -- Car and Driver
• "Seating is comfortably supportive, but taller drivers might find the Quattroporte a bit lacking in headroom. Also, the Quattroporte is clearly designed for only four, as indicated by the aggressive contours of the power-adjustable outboard rear seats." -- Edmunds

Interior Features

Maserati worked with Bose to design a new user interface to control climate and entertainment functions in the Quattroporte. Reviewers say the new setup is an improvement, and should lessen the learning curve for owners. Some, however, still experiences problems, particularly with the car's navigation system.

• "Some things about Italy will never change. The maze-like medieval towns will always be unnavigable, teenagers will always love cars and something on those cars, in this case the Sat/Nav, will never work as expected." -- Jalopnik
• "The handsome dash and console receive more logical controls for 2009, though they aren't likely to challenge Toyota for ergonomic supremacy anytime soon. The previous navigation system was one of the worst in the business, but the new Bose multimedia system makes it a distant memory. The Bose setup includes hard-drive-based satellite navigation, a CD/MP3/DVD player, satellite radio, digital music storage, iPod integration, Bluetooth and voice activation. It works reasonably well, though unlike competing systems such as MMI and iDrive, this one makes do without a control knob -- instead, there's a dual-mode dial on each side of the display screen and buttons lining the top and bottom." -- Edmunds
• "For help redesigning the miserable secondary controls of the previous model, Maserati turned to Bose and co-developed an infotainment system that makes inputting destinations and viewing current media selections much easier. The new, non-touch-screen display is quite trick, if somewhat cluttered at times. Indeed, often along our route, the map-which is the home screen-was nearly smothered by extraneous information. Its dual-knob and button-bank interface attempts to be retro but winds up neither terribly simple to use nor as intuitive (or Bluetooth-friendly) as some other systems we can name-higher-end Acura and Lexus products come to mind." -- Car and Driver