From automatically correcting for crosswinds, to brief moments of autonomous driving, to sensing that you鈥檙e about to fall asleep at the wheel, the 2013 Mercedes-Benz GL SUV offers virtually every technology aid you鈥檝e heard about. There may be no car better suited for long distance travel than the new GL, thanks to the comfy air suspension and whispery diesel engine that carries you 600 miles before refueling. 75,000. The only disappointment in the new GL is the tiny LCD display and mediocre navigation system in a vehicle so big. 2,800 depending on model) which rolls in Distronic Plus (adaptive cruise control) with Active Lane Keeping Assist and Active Blind Spot Assist. On straight roads with good lane markings, it gives you a semi-self-driving Benz for as long as 30 seconds. Not that you鈥檙e supposed to. Here鈥檚 how it works: A forward-facing camera in the rear view mirror watches the lane markers and warns, then corrects, if you drift (lane keeping).

From automatically correcting for crosswinds, to brief moments of autonomous driving, to sensing that you鈥檙e about to fall asleep at the wheel, the 2013 Mercedes-Benz GL SUV offers virtually every technology aid you鈥檝e heard about. There may be no car better suited for long distance travel than the new GL, thanks to the comfy air suspension and whispery diesel engine that carries you 600 miles before refueling. 75,000. The only disappointment in the new GL is the tiny LCD display and mediocre navigation system in a vehicle so big. 2,800 depending on model) which rolls in Distronic Plus (adaptive cruise control) with Active Lane Keeping Assist and Active Blind Spot Assist. On straight roads with good lane markings, it gives you a semi-self-driving Benz for as long as 30 seconds. Not that you鈥檙e supposed to. Here鈥檚 how it works: A forward-facing camera in the rear view mirror watches the lane markers and warns, then corrects, if you drift (lane keeping).

Distronic maintains your speed and slows, even stops, you if the traffic ahead slows. If you drift close to the lane, the car nudges the brakes on the opposite side and the drag pivots the car back into lane, just as a paddle dragging in the water pivots you canoe toward the paddle side. If I kept hands off the wheel, the car would right itself two, three or four times in a row but eventually it would ride over the lane marking. Every car offers parking sonar. The GL is one of several cars in the Mercedes-Benz fleet with Attention Assist, a set of algorithms that measures driver alertness, mostly through micro-movements of the wheel, and suggests you take a break if you fall below a threshold. I鈥檝e found that Attention Assist catches you when you鈥檙e drowsy and also some times when you think you鈥檙e not. Attention Assist is free. The Active Curve System is not free.

2,900. It鈥檚 a sophisticated leveraging action of the car鈥檚 suspension that reduces lean in turns, makes the driver feel more secure, and makes the passengers less annoyed by spirited driving. Where planes bank into turns so you feel no sideways motion, this reduces but never eliminates lean, in part because the lateral forces alert the driver to back off. 108,000, and there were some options it didn鈥檛 have. 570) that suck in moisture from the seat surface where the other vented seats blow air out. The one area where the GL is uncompetitive is the center stack. The LCD is part of the Comand system that is standard on all GLs and uses a control wheel like BMW鈥檚 iDrive. But the LCD is only 7 inches diagonal where it鈥檚 10 inches on the smaller BMW X5 SUV. Because the LCD is small, Mercedes doesn鈥檛 do split-screen for, say, navigation plus infotainment.

The navigation system is vanilla. If you鈥檙e in another screen (say audio setup), when a complex turn approaches, it doesn鈥檛 temporarily shift back to map view. In navigation view, you do get a split screen showing the exit but not which lanes exit and which go through. There are as many as 49 buttons on the center stack and at least eight more on the console (a lot). The Comand control wheel and the radio control wheel are satin metal-finish and a bit slippery. Bluetooth is standard but an iPod adapter is not. A six-disc CD/DVD changer is. Mercedes counters that almost every GL sold will have a premium package that includes a USB/iPod interface. That鈥檚 the bad of the center stack. Here鈥檚 the good. A 4.5-inch color LCD info display sits between the speedometer and tachometer and lets the driver glance down to see important information (phone, navigation, entertainment).