If you're pulled over for using an iPad while you're driving you'll get a ticket. But if you build the iPad into the car it's somehow okay.

love how looking at phone screens is (rightfully) considered bad while driving, but then they just put a big fucking tablet on cars.

Why not have both

My major problems with this design trend, in my own (biased) experience:

• Center console entertainment UI is usually the slowest thing ever made, making it an even bigger distraction than needed. I could develop muscle memory for blindly pushing the right virtual buttons, but the slowness makes this impossible. It's usually wildly under-specced, but what's stranger is that there's never an upgrade option you can buy from the manufacturer.

• Can't use the panel blindly, creating a big honkin' distraction within reach of the driver. Speed (see above), iffy capacitive touch with no haptic feedback, as well as multiplexing the UI through deep menus, are the chief culprits here. If there were standard controls that were always on screen in the same place, with a suitably responsive UI, this wouldn't be as big a problem.

• For systems that are fully-integrated, it's all or nothing. If the panel/CPU dies, you lose your stereo, navigation, and climate controls all at the same time. My car, fortunately, has the A/C physical controls. This creates a distinct point of failure which is nice - I'm pretty sure I will still have A/C if the panel craps out.

• It's dirt cheap to manufacture and I think we all know it. We're already paying historically high prices for cars, and cheaping-out on the bits we touch the most is just an extra kick to the junk at this point. To the manufacturers: we have remarkably better experiences on our freaking phones every day, so nobody but your grandma is impressed with the weak-sauce, crippled, bogus UX you bolt into your expensive vehicles. You're not making cars cooler, you're just making car ownership worse. Do better.

Reject smart cars because they're collecting your data and it will be used to increase your insurance rates.

The crazy thing for me is that apart from physical buttons, if car manufacturers actually just released models of 20-30 years ago as new launches, complete exterior and interior, they’d so well!

Edit - with just Bluetooth added but I’m cool with using a cassette adaptor of some sort. Also assuming the engines would be up to today’s emission standards. I mean just the shape and looks.

My AC doesn't need an OTA patch.

Having a touchscreen to operate your car with is a safety hazard compared to having buttons and knobs.

..... I'M JUST SAYING.

Leave me a phone sized screen for CarPlay and everything else can go back. I agree with the giant touch screen only stuff being nonsense, but CarPlay is life changing to my driving experience.

What cooks my god damn goose isn't the stupid screen I'm going to break one day. It's that they run buses for other systems through the radio so you can't replace it with what you want.

You might die on a hill if you attempt to control a car using a touchscreen.

Being able to feel controls instead of having to look at them while driving is key, but some of you take this to Luddite levels.

I can press any button I like on the console without looking, while knowing what button is.

I will never prefer anything else.

I'm really thankful that Audi rolled back whatever they were doing and gave me knobs and switched to deal with. Like in fucking planes and space shuttles !

And fingers crossed all this common sense gets enshrined in law soonish.

I want 3 things in a car navmod:

1. Decent enough sized screen for Android auto to show me the map. My 2018 Nissan leaf is probably the smallest I'd go on this, but I wouldn't even double it

2. For the love of GOD could we let me upgrade the unit, or force android auto to use my powerful-enough-for-this-purpose phone handle rendering the video feed? My pixel can handle an external monitor at 1440p no problem, I'd love to give the shitty PC in my car a break from scrolling maps at 3fps

3. Physical buttons for everything HVAC, can honestly take or leave the volume and tuner knobs as long as they're put on the steering wheel

Embrace tradition

Can we add 'cars with spare tires' to the list?

Having to call a damned tow-truck just to get a flat tire fixed is not a winning move if you're trying to sell how much your car benefits the environment.

I'd like to keep the Reverse Cam alongside the knobs personally.

Counterpoint:

And my axe.

Is this what the new subscribe-to-drive cars look like inside? Just a straight up tablet where the music and heat controls are supposed to be?

There's a middle ground. Give me a decent-sized [touch]screen for Android Auto with physical HVAC & media controls.

This is my daily drive. I do wish it had Bluetooth tough. I did get an FM Bluetooth transmitter, but it didn't work that well.

I barely like using my phonebat times, why the fuck would I want a tablet to control my car?