For the first time in 28 years of JD Power’s car owner survey, there is a consecutive year-over-year decline in satisfaction, with most of the ire directed toward in-car infotainment.
Not keen on cars with an over reliance on central displays for everything. Having a single unit controlling so many things that could easily be switches, dials or other things feels pretty dangerous.
Everything you need should be within hands reach, or easily adjustable without having to fiddle through displays
So they actually don’t need a car, just infotainment. A couch without wheels would do.
I guess a lot of cars are putting most of their controls behind infotainment systems. I know a lot of the EVs do this (Tesla, and Chevy for certain), so I think it’s more a backlash against that.
I don’t have any of that in my car, except for Apple CarPlay, and I’m fairly satisfied with it. My previous car had OnStar, and that included built in navigation, satellite radio, and wifi. Quite frankly, with the exception of the emergency services OnStar has, I don’t miss the rest of it, and I’m sure as hell glad I don’t have to access climate control and other options thorugh a touchscreen. Fuck that.
Amen. Give me knobs! I can adjust volume, station, temperature, fan speed, wiper speed, and my headlights without looking away from the road.
Really tempted to swap for a system with phone integration for the maps, but not if I sacrifice safety. I’ll just keep using my dash mount for my phone!
I had a 2019 Jetta GLI. I set the temperature the day I got it and never bothered fiddling with it in the 4 years I had it. The fan speed and airflow looked after itself just fine. Temperatures here swing between -35 to +35, so it’s not like we don’t have variability.
It had rain sensing wipers and automatic headlights which worked perfectly. It did have physical controls for those, but I only used the wash and high-beam switches.
It had built in navigation, but I tended to use Apple Carplay and Google maps and Spotify for music.
Now that version of the Jetta had physical controls for heated/cooled seats, HVAC and audio functions. I just never used them aside from the seat heat/cool.
It also had a pile of redundant controls on the steering wheel. That’s where I controlled volume or selection.
I like touchscreen controls for touchscreen functions. I have an Audi from 2019 when they were (I assume) trying for a best of both worlds approach using a touchless screen with console mounted controls including a weird touchpad and a control wheel. I might not want to drill through multiple menus to turn the ac up, but I do want to control my audio by tapping a screen rather than fiddling with console controls that require me to scroll through every available on screen widget with a scroll wheel.
My 2019 GLI has some of that; the radio controls are on the touchscreen, as well as some other functions for safety, drive mode, etc. but climate controls, cruise, lights, etc. are all manual. Thank God. Most of the touchscreen options related to the car are not available when driving…thank god again.
I test drove a Volt, and almost everything was on the touchscreen. Did not like. There is a comfortable medium. You’re right, no one wants to navigate through a bunch of menus when a knob does it so much easier, AND it’s so much safer.
guess I’ll be keeping my 2009 for a few more years then. all buttons and not a touch screen in sight!
The big problem is this custom dash crap. If they kept the screen to a normal double-din slot people could customize with what they want from the after market head units. But instead manufactures seem to be focused on designing the main unit in such a way that it cannot be replaced or upgraded, rendering the entire dash useless.
Absolutely a problem, that shit should be standardized amongst manufacturers so they can be easily replaced.
But then how will they get someone to spend $40k on a car with a slightly better screen a few years later?
A couple years ago I had a salesman try to use the “bigger screen” as the big selling point for going up in trim. I asked him why the hell would I want to take my eyes off the road to look at the screen while I’m driving. He said it was safer because I could see more, then I asked if that mean the cheaper trim didn’t have the same safety standards as the more expensive one.
So anyway, the wife “convinces” me to buy the more expensive trim…
No, because there is already a standard that worked for decades until it suddenly didn’t. The old standard is fine and doesn’t need a new one, just a return to actually being used.
I could give two shits about the infotainment dash. What I hate is the idea of a car having 8 computers that require a $3000 device to talk to them for troubleshooting. It’s bad enough having an ECM, PCM, TCM, and BCM. Most of which I can barely access with my OBD2 reader.