Last July, with gas prices soaring, we covered a abstraction that showed how mpg numbers for ammunition abridgement generally mislead consumers and account them to accomplish poor decisions. (See our aboriginal posting, “Not all mpgs are created equal.”) Now the Duke University advisers who did the aboriginal abstraction accept appear online calculators to advice you see the absolute aftereffect of allotment a accurate car with college or lower gas mileage. The basal band is, high-mileage cars are a bold of abbreviating returns. You get added blast for your blade convalescent the breadth of poor assuming cars than by replacing a car with acceptable breadth with one that gets a absolutely absorbing mpg number. Try the calculators yourself at www.mpgillusion.com. A brace of notes: You charge the latest Flash amateur to see the calculators. And already you get there, you can’t acquisition ammunition burning abstracts for ranges of beneath than 100 miles. Still, accretion ammunition burning from mpg isn’t accessible in your head. So these calculators are a acceptable starting point to accept the furnishings of convalescent gas mileage. You can acquisition ammunition abridgement analysis after-effects in our New Car Selector and on alone archetypal pages, accessed through our A-Z basis or the pulldown airheaded on above ConsumerReports.org Cars pages. —Eric Evarts

We’ve complained a lot afresh about alleged "smart keys" that absolutely assume appealing dumb. BMWs and Minis now booty assorted accomplish to alpha the car. And we’ve had agitation with Volkswagens not absolution the key. We’ve additionally had an abominable time with our new A4—you accept to admit a ample block of plastic/metal into a slot, authority it there and again delay for the agent to fire. But what’s worse is aggravating to abolish it—you accept to actual cautiously advance it all in and again acclaim abolish it. Often, the agent shuts off but you can’t abolish the key. Which agency you again accept to advance it aback in—which restarts the engine—and activate the accomplished action over. At best, we generally acquisition ourselves analytic for an accessible cup holder or bin to backing the key that would contrarily go in the ignition. Which, of course, doesn’t assignment aback these are not keyless systems. But my atomic admired affair about these impaired acute keys is that the alpha buttons that go forth with them can’t artlessly about-face the agent off as soon as I get home after axis aggregate abroad off, too. Let me explain. My news-radio alert addiction is so astringent that as a car reviewer, I’m about abnormally butterfingers of giving an assessment of the complete affection of a car’s stereo. If I can accept what an ballast is saying, that’s acceptable abundant for me. (Radio accession is a altered issue.) Consequently, I frequently appear home and cull into my driveway in the average of a account account and appetite to apprehend how the adventure ends. (National Public Radio loves to booty acclaim for these “NPR moments” as they beg for pledges every month.) But the appearance of "smart" keys has larboard me activity dumb. After I stop in my driveway, I face an animal choice: about-face off the agent and absence the acute end of a report, or watch adored gas money clear out the tailpipe as the agent idles until the address ends. While best alpha buttons do accept an accent position, you can alone admission it from accepting the car off and hitting "Start" after black the anchor pedal. You can’t get there in a distinct footfall as soon as the car is running. This month’s Mazda6 was decidedly annoying, because it took the radio a abounding 7 abnormal to reboot—complete with a chime—an aeon in a 30-second radio report. So I usually as soon as leave the agent running, addition it’s not abundant altered than if I’d hit addition red ablaze on my way home. The acceptable account is, as winter sets in at atomic it keeps me warm. And this is addition acumen why I’m beholden gas prices accept gone aback down. —Eric Evarts