The 599's cabin more than lives up to this car's intended role as a rapid GT car. It only has seating for two, which means there's a useful parcel shelf behind the seat to augment the large boot space.
Leather upholstery is standard and the seats have carbon fibre backs and electric adjustment, plus every owner we spoke to praised the seats for their comfort. In front of the driver is a large central rev counter which could be ordered with a yellow or red face when new. To the right of this is the speedo, while on the left is a screen for other functions, including the sat-nav.
The sat-nav is the only area of the 599 that owners homed in on to criticise when we spoke to them. Complaints range from the sat-nav being slow and out of date to it failing altogether. There were some other mentions of warning lights showing on the dash occasionally, but most of these can be dealt with by either restarting the car or using the battery isolator to cut power for five minutes and then reconnecting. If the car continues to show a warning light, a trip to a dealer is the only answer to have the fault code diagnosed.
In the centre console, simply rotary dials operate the ventilation and behind these are the three buttons that work the F1 gearbox fitted to most 599s. A carbon pack was a £7,000 option when the 599 was new and it's used to cover the centre console, dash top, sections of the steering wheel and the shift paddles for the F1 gearbox. Optional shift lights fitted into the top of the steering wheel are fine in the daytime but can be too bright and distracting at night.
PHer's view:
"Forget trying to use the sat-nav, it's useless. Less than useless, in fact, even when it was new. Still, I love the looks and the quality is easily as good as any other car I've owned, including Porsches and Audis."
Steve L