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Acura announces 2021 TLX Type S on-sale date and approximate price

Acura is clearing up a few nagging questions we had about the 2021 TLX Type S today. The company’s latest announcement spells out both the starting price and a precise on-sale date.  YouÂ’ll be able to drive a 2021 Acura TLX Type S home in May this year, and pricing starts “in the low $50,000s.” We wish Acura could be a little more specific on exact pricing, but apparently itÂ’s not ready to divulge that information yet. Regardless, this price point makes perfect sense when you consider that the regular TLX with its 2.0-liter turbo can be optioned up to about $50,000. ItÂ’s likely going to come in under the BMW M340iÂ’s price (starts at $55,695). On the other hand, the Audi S4 will most likely undercut the Type S with its $50,945 base price. Do keep in mind that both the BMW and Audi will likely need a heavy hand in the options list to equal the AcuraÂ’s equipment, just as the non-performance models require. As a reminder, the TLX Type S is getting a 3.0-liter turbocharged V6 that spits out 355 horsepower and 354 pound-feet of torque to the standard SH-AWD system. The 10-speed automatic is “sport-tuned,” and the car has a new Sport+ driving mode that isnÂ’t on the regular TLX that notches everything up to another level of aggressiveness. You can get NSX-inspired lightweight wheels that hide big Brembo brakes and can be wrapped in Pirelli P-Zero summer tires. The Tiger Eye Pearl exterior paint pictured here is a Type S-exclusive paint option, too. WeÂ’ll be looking forward to May this year, when we'll finally get behind the wheel of the Type S, which is the first Type S weÂ’ve seen in America for 13 years. Related video:

2020 Acura NSX leads this month's list of discounts

With its 573-horsepower hybrid powertrain and 0-60 time of 2.9 seconds, there's no doubt that the Acura NSX is an impressive machine. As its production numbers and pricing adjustments attest, however, it's not a big seller. And this month, Acura's high-end coupe has a larger monetary discount than any other vehicle in America. Buyers of the 2020 Acura NSX are scoring an average cut of $19,659 off the car's $159,530 sticker price. That equals a 12.3% savings for an average transaction price of $139,871. That's still a hefty chunk of change, but it's a reasonable sum for a vehicle with the NSX's performance chops. The next two vehicles in order of largest discounts follow the same luxury performance coupe trend. The Audi R8 is a much pricier vehicle than the NSX, which means its $16,146 discount only represents 8% off its average $200,086 sticker, but we doubt buyers are complaining. Next up is the BMW M8, a vehicle that has been at or near the top of this list more than once. The M8's average discount of $15,403 represents a 10.4% savings off its $148,880 retail price. Interestingly, that puts the M8 and NSX within a few thousand dollars of each other. For a look at the best new car deals in America based on the percentage discount off their suggested asking prices, check out our monthly recap here. And when you're ready to buy, click here for the Autoblog Smart Buy program, which brings you a hassle-free buying experience with over 9,000 Certified Dealers nationwide. Related Video:

Hands-on with Acura's novel touchpad infotainment interface

After Acura's Precision Cockpit was unveiled here in LA, I sat in the, uh, driver's seat of the wheel-less interior mockup to get a feel for how this new touchscreen-free touch interface works. There are a lot of good ideas inside. Here are 11 things you should know. It's less like a trackpad and more like a remote-control tablet. So instead of letting you move a cursor relative to its last location like the trackpad on a laptop, each point on Acura's trackpad is mapped to a corresponding point on the center display. If you want what's in the upper right corner of the display, you touch and click in the upper right corner of the trackpad. Simple. I figured it out in two minutes. Maybe less. The whole thing is surprisingly intuitive. The ease of use is helped by the fact that the targets on the screen are pretty big – no tiny "buttons" to fiddle with. The clicks are real. The trackpad actually moves when you press down, so no need for simulated haptic feedback. In their research, Acura engineers found that accidental touches and presses are a real issue. We could have told them that – hit a bump while using a finicky remote interface like Lexus's all-but-abandoned joystick thing, and you select an item half-way across the screen from the one you intended. The placement of the trackpad in this concept interior also helps avoid unintentional inputs – it's not in the middle of the center console where it might get brushed or bumped, but instead in its own little cave at the base of the center-stack waterfall. (Acura's low-profile button-based transmission selector suddenly makes a whole lot of sense.) View 13 Photos Lots of cues cut down on distraction. You hover over the option you want before positively confirming the selection with a hard press. There's no cursor to find and reposition like in the Lexus trackpad system The red highlight gives the necessary visual cue that you put your finger in the right place. The pad is slightly dished to give you a tactile cue of where the center and edges are. It allows you to build up muscle memory, sort of like how you know generally where the "keys" are on your smartphone or tablet's virtual keyboard by now. Or at least I do on mine. You look at the screen, not what you're touching. The problem with touch screens is that they have to be low down in the car so you can reach them. That means you have to look down from the road to stab at what you want.