Add Lincoln Zephyr ($29,660-$35,240 list) to the long list of cars competing in the overheated entry luxury sedan market, or what Lincoln calls "affordable luxury." For most motorists with an eye toward comfort and some performance, it's a competent four- to five-passenger sedan with a fine navigation system and killer premium audio system. Tech fans with a critical eye may be less sanguine: Some of the technology features you're looking for, such as Bluetooth, MP3 player connectivity, and satellite radio connectivity, didn't make it to market with the October 2005 launch. They'll be on 2007 models, possibly later.

Read on to find out how the Zephyr matches up against competitors from Asia and Europe. Or, feast your eyes on our photo slideshow covering the inside and outside of the Zephyr. For all of the facts (like fuel efficiency), skip ahead to our Fact File, it has the statistics we used for this review. And if you're feeling impatient, skip to the end to read our final thoughts. Click on the link below to continue on.

SLIDESHOW (13)

Slideshow | All Shots

Right now, the tally of Asian and European cars in this segment with a luxury/sporty flair is just about endless: Acura TL, Infiniti G35, Lexus ES330 from Japan; Audi A4, BMW 3 Series, Jaguar X-Type, Mercedes-Benz C-Class, Saab 9-3 from Europe. Not to mention the upmarket VWs and tricked-out Hondas. But the relevant American cars constitute a singular list of one: Cadillac CTS. With the Zephyr, the list of American entries doubles.

Zephyr is a cornerstore of the new Lincoln. There's also a vastly downsized 2007 Lincoln Aviator recently shown in concept form that looks more like a Lexus RX330 than a supertanker, and two more entry level cars for its Mercury affiliate, the Milan sedan and Mariner SUV.

Built for Comfort more than Corkscrews
A test drive through the twisty back roads of Connecticut's Long Island Sound suburbs shows Zephyr to be worlds apart — worlds better — from the Town Cars and big Shamu-class SUVs that form of lot of the brand's past image. It's pleasant to drive so long as you don't push Zephyr too close to the limit. In an around-town setting, if you turn the corner, head up a roughly paved road, and tromp the gas pedal, you've got a couple unsettled but not unsafe moments as the car tries to find its footing.

Lincoln says Zephyr's four closest competitors are Infiniti G35 and Acura TL (sportiest competitors), Cadillac CTS, and Lexus ES330 (plushest competitor), with Zephyr's ride characteristics falling between Cadillac and Lexus. In other words, you'll get a fine ride cruising the backroads of California wine country, but not if you leave wine country briefly to hot lap the Laguna Seca racetrack on Monterey Peninsula and dive into the Corkscrew turn. (When an automaker passes up the opportunity to compare a model to the Germans, it often means the suspension was built for comfort, not for speed.) For daily commuting, front-wheel drive is fine, but on performance cars, you want rear wheel drive or all-wheel drive. Zephyr's 221 horsepower approaches the limit of what the front wheels are happy handling, although it's nothing quite like the Acura TL: Tromp the pedal when the TL isn't pointed straight ahead and the 258 horsepower just about rip the wheel from your hands. The Zephyr will not unseat the Infiniti G35 or BMW 330i as the ultimate driver's car.

The exterior design is pleasant if not memorable other than the imposing waterfall grille (vertical strips of chrome) that is a Lincoln trademark and the large, C-shaped taillights. Continued...

The Zephyr should be pleasant to buy because the list of options is just six items deep, there's only one interlocking options choice (must order B to get A), and you can't pay more than $35,240 before discounts. A tricked out BMW 3 Series exceeds $45K; an Infiniti G35 approaches $40K. For the $29,660 base price you get a 221 horsepower V6 engine powering the front wheels (all-wheel drive comes in a year), six-speed automatic transmission (no manual shift gate), heated leather bucket seats in front with 10-way power adjusters, garage door opener, a six-speaker sound system with a CD player that reads MP3 if not WMA discs, 17-inch alloy wheels with 50-series tires, and six air bags.

All that's left to add are THX-II premium audio (14 speakers, 600 watts) for $995, navigation system paired with premium audio and adding $1,500 (package total $2,495), moonroof for $1,200, chrome alloy wheels for $895 that are especially popular on the West Coast, Xenon high-intensity headlights for $495, and power-ventilated seats for another $495. If your budget allows, we'd recommend tech fans go for the premium audio, nav system, Xenon headlights, and ventilated seats. The latter can help keep a driver comfortable at the beginning (when you're hot and sweaty) and alert at the end of a long trip. Moonroof is a personal choice and chromed wheels (they're not bigger chromed wheels) are even more-so. Set aside a couple hundred dollars to have a good electronics shop hack the car to make a seamless install (direct to the radio) of satellite radio, line-in jack or iPod connector, and possibly Bluetooth.

A bit of the price advantage is what's omitted or downplayed. There is no automatic stability control (worth a couple hundred dollars) that's common in this class, and no tire pressure monitors, for instance. Where Zephyr has speed-adjusted wiper speeds standard, others may use an optional infrared sensor that watches rain buildup on the windshield. One's good, the other's better.

Solid Navigation, No Bluetooth
The Pioneer navigation system with Navteq maps has a bright but slightly smallish 6.5-inch display. It's above average but others (Lexus, Infiniti) do nav better. On our test car, the synthesized voice sounded artificial and the data disc couldn't find some streets we could swear existed (that the car was parked under the street sign of one was pretty fair evidence in our favor, though we may have keyed in the name of the adjacent town). Once the car is moving, you can only enter previously set destinations; we'd rather take our chances with all-time accessibility. But the price ($1,500 of the $2,495 nav/audio package) isn't bad; compare that to Jaguar X-Type's $2,400.

Bluetooth for hassle-free, hands-free cellular calling can't be had now although the 2007s might get it. Acura (standard), Audi, BMW, Jaguar, Lexus, and Nissan all offer Bluetooth. Third-party Bluetooth, such as the Motorola IHF1000 kit, will set you back $200 plus installation — more than had Lincoln built it in.

Great Sounds, Few Sources
The premium THX-II audio is a first in passenger cars, at $995 it makes a worthwhile addition, and the music we played sounded great. Too bad there's not much choice in what those 14 speakers (two of them subwoofers) and 600 watts of amplification can play beyond AM/FM radio and MP3 CDs: No WMA CDs, no music from your iPod or any other music player using a direct cable connection, no satellite radio unless you slap a receiver module on the dashboard. Lincoln Mercury President Ed Giombetti says hard-wire music connections weren't offered because of uncertainty over what connection standards would be popular, or even if they'd be wired or wireless. Lincoln isn't alone in offering this dog-ate-my-homework kind of excuse for missing the boat on entertainment technology, and in a company selling Town Cars, they know boats. You could argue that with multi-year lead times to reengineer a car audio system, it wasn't clear in 2001 that iPod would become iPod and close in on 20 million sales. But MP3 players date to 1998 and the lowly line-in jack that works with every portable MP3, CD, and tape player extant has a longer history than Pamela Anderson.

Inside the cockpit, the leather seating is attractive and the overall look is worldly. The speedometer is round, not a long ribbon. The dash comprises brushed aluminum, lots of molded foam, and polished ebony or maple (real not petro) wood. The steering wheel is leather wrapped with wood accents. Our car was part of the early production run, which may explain some of the gaps between the various dashboard panels (exterior panels, too). Back seat room is pretty good if this is a small luxury sedan; if it's mid-size, as Lincoln says, then it's average.

The buttons and switches are neatly lined up, so much so you have trouble finding the right one. The nav panel has 16 essentially similar buttons. The steering wheel has eight lookalike rocker buttons, four on each side, and you have to memorize that it's third from the top on the right that switches music sources. (This switch is grandly labeled "media," even if the only choices for 2006 are from radio to CD.) The nav system is at the top of the center console stack; above are two rounded vent grilles and an analog clock; well below are the climate control system and a couple random buttons. Oddly, the buttons to do things you'd hardly ever do (turn off traction control, disable the passenger airbag) and are about four times the size of the nav buttons you use all the time.

Most of the cockpit illumination is LEDs, which are reliable, can be as bright as needed, and don't use a lot of power. They make the switches easier to read at night than the blue text-on-brushed chrome buttons are by day.

Safety, Security: Basics Covered
Zephyr provides all the necessary safety features and then some. It has ABS, six airbags, including "roll-fold" side air curtains that can wedge their way between the window glass and a sleeping passenger. High intensity (Xenon) headlights are an option. There's traction control and anti-lock brakes but not stability control. Backup sonar isn't available; over the life of the car, it will probably save you from backing into something that costs more to fix than the sonar cost ($300-$500).

Zephyr is the only car in the midsize segment with a keypad lock on the doors; if you forget your keys, you can get in the car but not start it (unless you stashed a spare inside). Lincoln also has what it calls perimeter security but that means when the car is locked, if somebody tries to break in, the alarm will sound. It isn't one of the force-field alarms that tell you to step back if you're getting near.

Great Online Tools
Lincoln ranks near the top on many J.D. Power & Associates satisfaction surveys. The quality of Lincoln's online tools may be one reason. The build-your own site is clear (aided by the limited number of options to choose), but so are most sites. The owners' site, lincoln.com/owners, has most of what you'd expect, and don't often find: next schedule service interval, so long as you keep the site up to date on your mileage and driving style; recall information; credit and lease info; and all owner guides.

The physical manuals are many and thick, six of them, totaling 412 pages. In the world of car manuals heavy with Don't Try This At Home warnings, that's excessive but not comparatively excessive. And the six manuals include two fold-out quick-start guides for the car and the navigation system, which almost excuses how Lincoln needs 40 pages to describe the warranty on the tires.

Zephyr represents the rebirth of a classic American badge, used on Lincoln affordable luxury models in the the 1930s and 1940s. To underscore that this is an American car, Lincoln's current "Landmarks" ad campaign is heavy on American imagery, showing the Empire State Building, St. Louis Arch, and Golden Gate Bridge. No images from Japan, though, which provided the basic body structure in the form of the Mazda6 sedan (Mazda is a Ford affiliate), or Hermosillo, Mexico, where the Zephyr is built. (The same Mazda6 platform serves as the underpinnings of the similar Ford Fusion and the more entry level Mercury Milan.)

Lincoln brought the car to market quickly, in about two years. We believe haste, rather than inattentiveness at focus groups or product managers' failure to notice their kids' friends all carrying iPods, explains the absence of some of the tech features. And that makes the Zephyr a car more worth looking at in the fall of 2006, when the 2007 models come on-line, if you're a technology-driven buyer.

The tagline for Lincoln marketing reads "Reach Higher," and it's advice Lincoln should heed as well as its customers. In the highly competitive environment Lincoln chose, good isn't always good enough. Smooth performance and value is here today; the good stuff may be a year off: satellite radio, all-wheel drive, possibly Bluetooth and that audio line-in jack. Mainstream motorists will find Zephyr a viable choice; technology fans will find themselves disappointed.

Here are the facts and figures that we've compiled throughout our review process. Here at TechnoRide.com, we believe in full disclosure. So, here you go...