Audi Q7: Master of the Volume

In the Q7, Audi has made her need for exacting surroundings too easy to access. You see, the designers of the Q7's interior put the volume knob for audio system in an unusual location -- right next to the passenger seat on the center console. Normally this veering from the standard would be only mildly annoying -- a function I'd quickly learn and maybe come to appreciate. But in this case, the knob's proximity to the better half puts it in an irrsistible location. Now I'm dealing with an assault on the volume every 30 seconds. Power ballads are go from eardrum-searing highs to where's-the-power lows. Grunge rock becomes frustratingly sanitary. Death metal turns positively wussy. And it all happens right at the climax -- the zenith of the song when Angus Young is about to rip the strings from his guitar or Eddie Vedder is about to deliver an incendiary set of vocals. I even captured one of her sneak attacks mid adjustment:

See how that knob provides her the unusual opportunity to curtail some musical masterpiece by nipping the knob without her hand ever entering the driver's peripheral vision? It's a cruel trick Audi has played on its consumers. Luckily, Audi also provided a solution to this little game of "Master of the Volume." It looks like this:

And it's deadly effective. She turns it down. I turn it right back up. So there.

Josh Jacquot, Senior road test editor @ 6,378 miles