It doesn't sound like a Mercedes," opined my passenger. She had a point. The supercharged, sixteen-valve, 1.8-liter DOHC in-line four in the C230 Kompressor has the aural quality of a vacuum cleaner.

The first thing that caught my eye as I approached the Mercedes C230 was the chrome "1.8" badge on its rear hatch. A 1.8-liter hatchback from Mercedes? Small-car owners may associate the words ...

What happens when you cross a sport sedan with an entry-level luxury car? This sounds like the setup for a joke, but there's little humor in the answer. The "entry level" and "sport-sedan" combo ...