It looks like supernissans.net (Via Autoblog) spilled the beans on the 2009 Nissan Maxima a day early, but that's good news for us, right? Here's an interior shot of the new Maxima, which looks considerably more upscale than the earlier car. Techwise, there's a larger LCD screen, a 9-way (!) control pad beneath it, and about 172 buttons. That's the polar opposite of BMW's iDrive design, which uses only the single haptic-feedback trackball-like controller—but we all know how well that turned out, so maybe Nissan's approach will work.

This car started life in the 80's as a "four-door sports car," as the marketing campaign originally went. The two 90's generations improved on that concept, with better straight-line performance and handling, and what I thought were sharp designs overall. After that, the 2000 and 2004 generations were odd; better technically, but not as distinctive, especially after the 2002 Altima refresh ate into the Maxima's customer base and gave it an identity crisis. This new-for-2009 design looks decidedly upscale in comparison and, if anything, offers a clearer distinction between it and the current, lower-cost Altima.