Is there an easy way to spot if a vehicle has ABC, Drive Dynamic Seats, and Distronic/Night Vision?

If it has the night vision button by the headlights, will it always have Distronic?

Does ABC have a different looking button compared to Airmatic?

Do the drive dynamic seats have different buttons?

Im asking because ive been looking at cars on Carmax (2007/8) models, and they never have the proper packages listed. They do take a good amount of photos and I can always have them email me other photos as well, so if its something in the a picture that I can spot I will know if it has the feature.

Im debating a 2007 S600, or an S550 4Matic. 550 will be about $6,000 cheaper, but its tough to find out that has the options I want. They do flip inventory pretty quickly though. Either way I would be getting their warranty.

I would prefer the 4Matic over a V12 in Ohio, call me crazy, I know. S600 would require $2k on snow tires and rims, so its an $8K difference.

Is the ABC worth trying to find, vs Airmatic? Im 31, I really just want a nice freeway cruiser for my 16 mile commute. I want nice leather, quiet, music, massaging seats, distronic, and a smooth ride. Also I need something I can get a remote starter in.

On the note of massaging seats- how intense/deep can they get? I tested a brand new CLS550 and those seats REALLY massaged well, I loved it, but I dont like the interior. I tested the S550 but only tested "fast/vigorous", it was significantly lighter than the CLS... I wonder if "Slow/vigorous" would have been better/deeper. Im a dentist, so on my way home id like something massaging by back.

I have an '11 X5 4.4 TTV8 right now, its a nice smooth, quiet ride (surprising considering its size and the 315 wide RFTs and 20" rims), but the leather quality is atrocious, and I cant get comfortable in the 20 way multicontour seats (to the point of lower back soreness).

 

Distronic:

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3533/...ef3edd31_o.jpg


Night Vision note the cutout near the mirror on the windshield. Just slightly off center (note the 2010+ S Class has one cutout for the active high beam assist and a second cutout for the night vision so don't get confused if you're looking for a facelifted model):
http://ipocars.com/imgs/a/f/t/i/d/me...2005_1_lgw.jpg

Switch on the far left of the headlight switch.

http://www4.pcmag.com/media/images/1...ght-vision.jpg


Night Vision and Distronic are separate options. I do believe they might've been bundled together the first model year but I'm not sure.




S600s come with every option. However, there was a shortage in Distronic supply the first model year so Mercedes-Benz did bundle some S600s with the AMG bumpers aka Sport Package and without Distronic.

 

Good to know regarding some 07 600s not having distronic, I didnt know that.

Do you know of any way of finding out if the seats are the dynamic ones vs static?

 

I would get an EPC account which will allow you to run the VIN and get the datacard which lists all of the features of the vehicle. This will eliminate any guess work or speculation, because Carmax typically has incomplete/incorrect feature listings. You can get an EPC account for free here: http://epc.startekinfo.com/epc/.

 

thanks for that link. should be useful. their registration system seems to be down at the moment though, i'll try again later

 

Or input the vin on this site http://www.neoriginal.ru/cat/mb/models__1_1 ..

 

Ive tried the VIN decoder, it doesnt seem to list all the options correctly. It also has trouble with newer VINs it seems

 

Yeah get the EPC subscription (free) when it comes back live. Then you can plug the VIN in and see what features the car has.

I don't think there's any way to tell from photos if the car has dynamic seats because you have to control it through the screen and controller- so it seems all software based. Physically looking at the seat doesn't' give you any clues unless if the seat is torn apart.