It turns out that more technology in cars isn’t necessarily something customers want, and it’s not really improving their driving experience. We know my thoughts on the matter, but I’ll do my best to stay impartial on this latest survey from JD Power that shows most customers don’t appreciate technology in cars unless they can see a clear benefit to them.
JD Power’s 2024 U.S. Tech Experience Index Study evaluated over 81,000 drivers’ experience with “advanced vehicle technologies” in 2024 model year vehicles after 90 days of ownership, It turned out to be a pretty mixed bag when it came to what people liked using. There are a number of tech features that customers like using because they feels that it answers their needs, but at the same time there is a whole lot that don’t get used very often or are continually annoying, according to the survey.
…
I got a new car recently. The best feature it has is the adaptive cruise control. You can set cruise control and if the car in front of you is going just a bit slower than the cruise control, you will not creep up on it.
Most of the other shit is useless. It has that magic rearview mirror that is really a camera, but I dont like using it because it is easier to focus on a real mirror than a display. it also has the cameras that read the road signs, but they often pick up the wrong info anyway, especially in a construction zone.
At least it has real buttons for the HVAC. I sat in three other cars, and two of them didn’t have HVAC buttons. I got right out. Car makers like the screens because they think they can eliminate buttons, but buttons are more effective.
I wish my stereo system in my RX 450h were easily swappable. i have had a swappable stereo in a car since my 2005 suzuki wagon
I have one in my 2017 Mitsubishi mirage! Its a manual too! I love it, looks like its from the 90s.
I’d genuinely buy one of those, but they’re just too expensive still. I’ll just buy a car from the 90s for a fraction of the price.
A backup camera and an Android Auto/Apple CarPlay head unit radio that sounds decent. That’s all I want in a car for “tech” that isn’t a safety feature. Everything else can go.
Yeah, when I drive other people’s newer cars, the only thing I miss going back to my early 2000s model is the backup camera.
I’ve got a magnetic clip for my phone on the dash, and a 3rd party Bluetooth > FM converter and it makes for a perfect gps and audio solution.
This article strokes my confirmation bias!
I love my 2010 Toyota with 140k miles, and I hope it runs forever. I could afford a new car if I wanted one, but all of the options have been getting worse for years! It’s just a car, but it’s a car from the perfect era of technology to be stuck with forever, and it drives beautifully.
I wish it got better gas mileage by 2024’s standards, for both financial and environmental impacts, but I believe it’s net better on both fronts for me to keep driving it than to replace it early. Fortunately it doesn’t snow where I live, so road salt won’t inevitably rust out the undercarriage.
There’s an aux in for the factory stereo, and I have a $25 BLE audio adapter with a ground loop isolator so there’s no alternator whine despite it being powered by the car. It’s not the most quiet for speakerphone calls, but it’s perfectly functional, and I’ve easily replaced it multiple times. It’s so much better than having a bad native Bluetooth audio system from that era.
I have a really solid dashboard mount for my magnetic phone mount, comprised of pieces from three different companies for maximal awesomeness. Then there’s my USB C PD supply that meets the charging standards of the present day relatively inexpensively and upgradably to any brand, powered by the “cigarette lighter” power socket. The existence of this simple medium wattage automotive DC power port is the greatest legacy left to us by the tobacco smokers of yesteryear. Is it gone yet in the latest cars?
A really slick trick I learned somewhere (maybe on reddit during the good years) is to use tiny zip ties on a cable that must run across your dashboard, such as the one to my mag charger. Put them at very strategic locations on the cable and facing the right way, and snip off the zip tie ends while still leaving a tail maybe about 1/4”, then jam that tail in between two pieces of dashboard trim. Do that repeatedly and the cable will go neatly and orderly around all your buttons and knobs without ever getting in the way.
An aftermarket dashcam is one thing that felt very worthwhile but was actually a decent amount of work to install, since I pulled a bunch of trim and ran wires through the headliner for that clean look with a rear facing camera mounted on the outside of the back. But I think those aren’t quite yet standard other than in Teslas.
2010 was the pinnacle of car technology, change my mind!
We need some serious federal regulation against bullshit in vehicles.
Every function that is normal to use while in motion needs a physical button.
Absolutely no fucking spyware reporting back to the manufacturer.
Most of the bullshit exists because of federal regulations requirements that they ran away with. Even backup cameras (which are arguably useful) because of shape/size/economy restrictions causing rear windows to be less easy to see out of.
Backup camera was mandated because of stronger pillar requirements to increase protection in rollovers, which was mandated because of an increase in rollover crashes, which was caused by an increase in SUV and Truck sales, which was caused by an increase in consumer demand for trucks and SUVs, which was caused by an increase in marketing for Trucks and SUVs which was caused by decrease in (relative) profit margin on sedans/coupes/wagons which was caused by the light truck loophole in CAFE standards, which was put in by manufacturers in the first place.
So I blame the corporations, their lobbyists, and the payroll politicians for it.
Backup cams are great though, quit complaining.
No shape of window will let you see a toddler directly behind your car.
I don’t want to ban it. Some people apparently want it (well, or at least the price reduction that comes with the auto companies having a new revenue source). I’m hesitant to try to impose my preferences on them.
I just want an option to pay regular price for a car myself and not have everything I do be data-mined. If it costs $N to pay your costs and make your profit, just charge me $N. I just want to be the customer in the relationship, not the product.
They operated just fine like that for decades. I don’t see a need for that to change.
It’s funny, because there actually is 0 price reduction in most cases.
It is literally even more expensive cars and the corporations double dipping to make extra profit.
Except for maybe some lesser-known Chinese brands that I have no point of reference for, I don’t believe there is a single corporation that has made their “smart” cars with tracking on-par or cheaper than their counterparts.
If the backdoor exists, it will be abused.
Also, that relies wholely on trusting the manufacturers to not mine your data when they have the ability to collect it.
It beggars belief that people still make the argument you responded to after the whole Clownstrike debacle.
If the way you want the market to work is “everyone does things the way I want” rather than “let everyone choose what they want”, the chance that the single route that is taken is not what you want is considerably greater.
Choice is good.
A reasonable opinion on lemmy? Prepare for the downvotes, it’s a pitchfork circlejerk here!
Jalopnik - News Source Context (Click to view Full Report)
Information for Jalopnik:
MBFC: Left-Center - Credibility: High - Factual Reporting: High - United States of America
Wikipedia about this sourceSearch topics on Ground.News
https://jalopnik.com/drivers-hate-the-tech-in-cars-1851631523
Yep. I’m hoping my current car holds out until this 'smartphone on wheels" trend reverses.
‘smartphone on wheels’*
*Apple CarPlay and Android Auto not supported.
Honestly that’s all I want out of the center screen.
I like my 2018 Outbacks layout. Physical controls for AC, knob for volume, and a reasonable touch screen. The gauge cluster has a small screen in the center that shows me some basic info I’d like to see like tire pressure, MPG, etc.
I’m in this scenario, too.
When I needed a new car in 2019 I somehow found a six speed manual Crosstrek that has all physical buttons for climate and radio/volume that also has a backup cam and a touchscreen for CarPlay/Android Auto.
It’s perfect.
I drive an Audi Q7 and every time I turn my headlights on, I get warnings about how my “Side Marker Lights” are malfunctioning.
First, no, they’re working fine.
Second, this seems to be super common on the Q7.
Third, the only “fix” is a $4,000 headlight assembly replacement.
Or, you know, connect an ODB-II device and disable the side marker lights.
The lack of physical buttons in new cars should be considered alarming from a safety POV.
Yeah, it’s why I’m considering Mazda for my next vehicle. Granted, my 2010 Civic needs to get closer to “death” (about 100K more miles or so).
While it would be nice to have a screen for music and nav, I absolutely hate any car where you NEED to use the screen to do things. It feels like distracted driving is designed into cars these days…
subway surfers at a traffic jam
This is why I chose a Mazda. Buttons for everything. I didn’t even realize I had a touchscreen until cleaning the interior one day with the radio going.
My Ford clearly has a touchscreen, and it’s nice, but I’ve also got buttons for everything I need while driving. That’s the way it should be.
I’m ok with a decent amount of tech in a car. Like I’m fine being able to connect my phone to the car and have android auto take over the infotainment system.
But the HVAC stuff needs to be buttons I can access/control without looking or very minimal looking.
I don’t want/need my car to have a SIM card, or connect to wifi, and report what I’m doing. If they want to do that, then they can give me the car for free and I’ll drive it around letting them collect my driving habits.
Edit: Oh, and I’m sure as hell not paying some subscription fee on top of the price of the car.
I have a 2023 Mazda CX-5 and it has the perfect amount of tech for me. The headunit isn’t touch screen, but you get used to the control knob after about a day and eventually it just feels second-nature. Also, all of the hvac controls are physical knobs and buttons, which is amazing.
But the HVAC stuff needs to be buttons I can access/control without looking or very minimal looking.
100% this. I shouldn’t have to click through 2 menus on a touchscreen to change a basic environmental control. Give me a damn knob, so if I want to change something I can reach my hand over and turn 2 clicks without taking my eyes off the road.
If they want to do that, then they can give me the car for free and I’ll drive it around letting them collect my driving habits.
I mean, that’s kind of what they’re doing in that having another revenue stream will reduce the car price relative to what would have been the case if they couldn’t do so.
If some people want to make that trade, I think that they should have the option to do so.
I don’t personally want to make that trade myself, though.
I disagree, most of these subscriptions options are all built in and “enabled” if bought. There ain’t no car manufacturers looking to reduce their car prices for us. It’s profit above everything
Good news, lawmakers in the US finally started looking at this issue.
Bad news: probably will take years for change
Spoiler from the future: it’s legal, and there’s nothing you can do about it.
There are numerous headlines like:
118th Congress on track to become one of the least productive in US history
So good luck with that.
The company I work at is tangentially related to car company data collection. And this week, all employees received an email that we were legally required to save all records newer than 2005 related to a specific car company’s onboard data collection service.
So it does seem like the investigation has already got a subpoena or smth.
General Motors
Is the car company involved, yes.
There’s activity at the state level too in multiple states. I heard something about California, then not a lot. Bunch of articles about Texas.
I’m ok with a decent amount of tech in a car. Like I’m fine being able to connect my phone to the car and have android auto take over the infotainment system.
This reminds me of my 2016 Honda Civic. It had just the right amount of tech.
As of 2022, Toyota still put physical buttons on their HVAC system and audio system.
I know because, against my advice, my wife bought a Toyota Rav4 Hybrid in 2022. I can’t tell her how to spend her money, but at least the car she got didn’t have some of this other bullshit.
I have a 2008 tundra a coworker just bought a new one so I asked for a ride. It was nice to see under the enormous center display, the HVAC controls!
Hey, at least she picked one of the most reliable cars on the market.
It’s a good car. I just wish she hadn’t decided to buy one in 2022. It’s bad enough to buy a new car now, it was worse then.
Out of curiosity, why didn’t you want her to buy that specific vehicle?
I didn’t think she should have bought any car. Her old car worked. It wasn’t in the best shape in the world, but it was fine. And 2022 was a terrible year for buying a car.
That’s how you do it. Drove my 99 Crown Vic until the wheel literally fell off. Had it put back on and did another 80k on it. Traded it in at the dealer 4 years later, in working order, simply because it cost 80 dollars a week in gas, and that was back in 2018.
Yep. I had a 2002 Civic that I was planning to drive into the ground, but an idiot mechanic accidentally left the oil cap off when he was fixing it and it eventually destroyed the engine. The amazing thing is it took a very long time to destroy it. We successfully drove my car back from Baltimore to where we live in Indiana and several two hour plus round trips after that before it conked out on me coming home one day back in 2019. So I bought a used 2016 Prius and I plan to drive that into the ground. I just don’t need a fancy new car. I’d like to get an EV only because I hate getting gas, especially in the winter, and if I never had to do it again, I’d be really happy. But I don’t want one enough to get rid of the car I have now.
I drove the Vic with essentially a liter of burnt Hershey chocolate syrup for 3 hours on the highway, and then daily’d it for another 5 days.
Teens are rough on cars, but it survived.
Oh, the COVID-19 shortages? Yeah, that’s a good point.
I love my subaru outback. It’s a great car. It does all the car things exceptionally well. It holds a lot of stuff. Snow, mud, fuck you it’s all pavement to me baybeee.
I fucking hate my Outback’s climate control, entertainment, map, and information screen. I understand newer models have improved slightly. It’s still awful. The only good thing about that fucking screen is that I can turn everything on from my phone. Literally every other function is awful to try to access and use while you’re driving.
2018 Impreza Base here. Manual ac controls (where, how fast, how hot), but the touchscreen infotainment is still AIDS. Several seconds from press to recognition. I need the screen to actually do stuff when I press it, not leave me guessing if I hit it right. If they can’t put a faster cpu, they need to have programmers that can optimise these units so they run responsively. There’s no excuse for that legendary input lag.
Good car though, other than that.
Similar complaint here. We were ready to replace our 2011 outback and decided it would make sense to get something at least a bit more modern. Loved our outback, and honestly would have bought another if it weren’t for that damn screen.
After getting a gander at that thing, we seemingly confused (or probably just disappointed) our salesman by insisting we wanted the most simple, stripped-down style console they had to offer. Apparently we’re not the most common customers, but i know I’m kinda weird so fair enough. After he went back inside to find out which models they had on the lot that might fit that description, the only one that had a “simple” console was the base model Forester. It was just not enough to transition over from our comfy 6-cyl beast that just had a 6-cd changer with a 1-inch-tall screen and an aux jack, but everything was operated by buttons. Even the rear view mirror had a clever backup camera integrated into it. Makes more sense that way, imo. It was everything we needed and only a smidge more.
I really wish we could have just bought a newer model of the exact same car feature-wise… That outback was a great car 🙂
I just bought a forester a few months ago, and my 2 stipulations on the cars I was looking at were all-wheel drive because I live in snow country, and a car no newer than 2018 (IIRC) because that was the year car companies largely switched from manual controls to a 16-inch screen with everything, including climate control, accessed from an app.
When I was talking to the guy at the dealership I bought it from and mentioned how much I disliked the new screens, he outright said, “Yeah, a lot of people don’t like them.”
Got a '24 outback late last year. For the most part I love it-it’s comfortable, holds my giant dogs and it’s way better to drive in bad weather than my previous car.
I’d read reports on subaru forums that infotainment was bad, so my expectations were low. But even basic stuff isn’t functional. It has gotten less responsive over the months (reminder: we’ve had it just barely a year). The screen has several seconds of lag with every touch, and sometimes controls just don’t work at all. I don’t like that we have to use it for temperature control, and android auto integration is clunky (though that may not be Subaru’s fault).
Add that to the horrifying data collection practices and it makes me question ever getting a Subaru again.
Is it possible to get some kind of firmware update that you may not have received?
kagis
This Reddit thread makes it sound like you need to manually do it or the dealer will do it as part of the regular maintenance. Not sure if this is specific to that model year.
https://old.reddit.com/r/Subaru_Outback/comments/18cjt00/software_update_december_2023/
Reminds me I need to update mine!! Did you have to take this in to the dealer to get it updated or did you do it yourself?
Dealer did that
What does the dealer charge?
I am not sure. It was part of my regular maintenance.
And
Does this help the PAINFULLY slow response in the screen?
Yes, it does! The lags are very short now, if there are any at all.
The people there are also complaining about the touchscreen instead of physical controls.
Hey good catch! I’ll try to ring my dealership to see if I can get that checked out during my next oil change visit.
Thanks
I stopped using Android Auto on my infotainment system. I thought it was just me but when I’m using navigation (Google maps or wyze), the second I lose service for any reason, it completely exits out and cancels my navigation. I found that if I use it in my phone, it doesn’t have that issue.
2020 Subaru Forester, but friends with other cars (VW, Honda) mentioned the same issue. Not sure if this has been fixes in recent Android Auto updates or in newer cars, but I’m not going to chance it anymore.
When carplay works, it’s great. But mine constantly has issues connecting to phones. Both my wife’s iPhone, and my Android. Both are flagships that are a couple years old, so still very current and sufficient specs.
Meanwhile, my old aftermarket Bluetooth radio connects every time with no issue.
I do like the convenience of GPS and audio on the car tablet when it works. But honestly, it’s a distraction when it’s being fussy.
Exactly my experience.
Phone dash mount all the way!
I don’t mind tech, i hate bad tech
give me buttons and dials, not touch screens and ai. I want to drive, not check social media. I’ll be keeping my 2009 until the engine locks up.
It’s not perfect, but the new (2019+) mazda system is very nice. It’s all controlled by buttons and dials, zero requirement to ever touch a screen. It all feels quite thoughtfully done, especially when you compare it to fords or teslas with a big dumb laggy iPad stuck to the dash.
I appreciate some of the tech. GPS, connecting phones to the infotainment, backup cameras. You know, the things that actually improve the car. Heck I’ll even take push to start. But for the love of God don’t put essential controls and climate control on a touchscreen. If I get hit with a pile of slush from a driver on the other side of the road and need to engage my windshield wipers immediately, a touch screen is a recipe for disaster. Also, bring back the PRNDL stick. I don’t care if it’s an automatic I need to know what gear I’m in immediately without needing to look away from the truck in front of me that’s backing up at a stop light because he thought he could make it.
