MellonC00

Southern CA had end of the world like rain for a about a week or so. by east coast standards it is a little bit above normal but the roads and drainage around here can't handle this water. As such, there were lots and lots of standing water for me to try different drive modes in the car. Sport mode (my typical set up) wasn't helpful and kept spinning the front wheels (for split second) and kept on engaging the traction control. Normal mode was fine but it still spun the front wheels when turning from the start - say, when existing the highway and turning immediately right or left.

Out of curiosity I put the car in snow mode which "retards" the responses quite a bit. For the heck of it, I floored it from a stop sign in very wet weather. To my surprise, it spun all 4 wheels for a fraction of a second. And watching the graphics, I saw the rear wheel drive was engaged up to about 38 mph. Going around highway entrances where there is long sweeping curve this came in handy.

MellonC00

Adding some additional comments after driving in snow and now mud/snow combination up in the mountains.

Good:
The snow mode works surprisingly well. I was pleasantly surprised. The snow/mud condition up in Big Bear area after the recent snow storm followed by very warm couple days created a perfect opportunity to test out the car. Even in 2 inch thick mud that completely covered the top part of my shoes (so slippery I couldn't stand straight) the car dug itself out of the miserable condition.

it retards both wheels when one wheel is losing traction. this was helpful when one side was on firm ground and the other side super slippery. It doesn't average the RPM of both wheels. I think it simply slows both wheels down so much so that you get crawl out of trouble.

Bad:
19 inch wheels in mud..... nuff said

Suspension is definitely tuned for the paved road. On the dirt trails, it transmitted every single gravel, bump and pot holes.

snow mode eats up the battery so quick. I went from full to 1/4 mark (necessitating the engine coming on) in about 10 minutes of slow crawl.

Droid13

Snow mode is like having two guys get out and push. It's not going to win you any hill climb competitions, but it's a nice little kick in the rear when you need it.