CVT: does it really suck?

After five years of driving a really old Daihatsu Move 2nd generation, I've finally upgraded to this:



2011 Mazda Demio Sport, 1.5L.

As with any new purchase in life, it's the difference between the new thing and the old thing that really defines the final "experience".  But the biggest difference between the this car and all the cars I've driven before, is that this one was equipped with a CVT.

Since I heard of CVT I always thought of it as the "loser tranny", that kills all feeling of acceleration and makes the car boring to drive.  I was actually terrified that without the gear shifting, it wouldn't feel like a real car anymore.

Now with actual driving experience, I think CVT are pretty damn good.   The bottom line is that it keeps the engine revving at the ideal point at any given time, so it does have this kind of "perfection" feeling in its concept.

Casual driving is so much quieter.
If you coast through the city at a regular pace the rpms never go past 2500 even when you're getting off from a red light.  Thats QUIET.  Every auto-car I've ever driven up to now almost always goes past 3000 in first gear before it's willing to shift to second.  The Demio can provide all the acceleration you need in normal circumstances and never go past 2500.

Highway Coasting is made even quieter.
I'm guessing because the CVT allows a wider range of gear ratios, even when going at about 120km/h on the highway, the rpm meter still does not go over 3000rpm.  This means maintaining a high speed on the highway is quieter with CVT.

Acceleration is even more responsive.
If you want to accelerate hard the CVT responds almost linearly to how hard you depress the accelerator.  The harder you push down, the higher the RPM's, until it reaches at maximum of 4200 which produces the maximum torque on a Mazda Demio.  There's of course a little bit of lag as the tranny computer adjusts to your sudden change in driving style.  But it's way better than an auto because the auto has to downshift in addition to reacting to your driving style change, causing another 0.5 second lag where the car does not accelerate at all.

.. but it does feel a little... boring
Because the engine revs at a fairly constant rate throughout your drive, you don't get that trademark low->high->low->high RPM orchestra from shifting gears.  So, it does lose a little bit of flair or character.  But I only really missed this in the first few days... it's something that can be forgotten quickly.

The car picks up speed deceptively quick.
Because of aforementioned lack of noise, the car actually picks up speed a lot more quickly than you'd be aware of.  I mean there were many times I thought... judging by the noise... I should only be about 60km/h but bam I was already past 80km/h.  Definitely needs time to get used to.