This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
I have a 2006 Chevy Malibu. It goes "vroom" and gets from point a to point b. I bought a Bluetooth thing that plugs into the cigarette lighter and a little hook for my phone so now I can make calls hands free, use the GPS easily, and I can listen to my music.
It's perfect lol
I'm still driving my 2007 Volvo with less than 100k miles and it's perfect. In excellent shape, just did a 2000 mile road trip no problem.
I went to test drive some new cars and HATED all of them. I've driven plenty of cars, some good some bad, but nothing pisses me off like needing an operating manual to adjust HVAC, radio, seats, mirrors etc.
Im holding onto my car as long as i can but I'm concerned about what I'll do when it finally dies. BUTTONS guys, wtf was wrong with tactile buttons?
It's not a joke, the majority of people carry around a crazy amount of technology in our phones.
And it's not meaningfully replaced in the console. I don't know what GM's thinking because I will never accept a business or personal vehicle that doesn't have Car Play/Android Auto ever again. It's that useful...
Just give me an amp with Bluetooth so I can play my phone through the car speakers. Anything the car makers produce will be woefully out of date before I sell the car.
Last car I bought was a 2015, infotainment in it is a disaster but completely ignorable/replaceable. If cars keep going the way they are, Ill drive what I have into the ground.
Cars should have a screen with HDMI+USB plugs. Then you connect the microcomputer of your choice, be it an Android box, an apple cad box, a Raspberry Pi. Hell manufacturers can even make their own Honda or Toyota box but make the screen connection an open standard. Then when the tech becomes old (every 5 years) you can swap it. Cars have a longer lifespan than tech.
If something like the AC, gear switching, volume controls, or another essential function is only usable via the touchscreen, I'd just stop considering that car because it's unsafe and time consuming to use touchscreens in cars. They're right, too much tech in cars is very annoying and I think most people (like me) would rather have dedicated physical buttons to control most actions in a car.
My prior car had no fancy features, the nicest thing it could do was read MP3's burned on to a CD, and hold 6 CDs in the player. I traded it in and got newer car, and I think it's level of fanciness is just right for me. It has a screen, I ignore it most of the time, unless I plug my phone in to listen to music. Then I use the screen to get into Youtube Music and that's it. Or the same situation as before, but I need to navigate with Google Maps.
So by and large I can 100% ignore the screen, unless I plug in the phone. But all control of Next Track/Back, volume up/down is controlled by buttons on the steering wheel.
The largest nightmare for me is tough sensitive controls FOR EVERYTHING! I've read that it's becoming more and more common in new expensive cars, and I have not interested in that bullshit.
My wife's (2023) Rav4 shows texts on the screen when she receives them while driving. I'm just amazed at that.
useful technology has been neglected for years. simple thing like autostart and remote warm up/cool down have been outsourced instead of built in. some brands are light years ahead with apps/monitoring and people are figuring that out.
The only tech I want in my car is satellite navigation, Bluetooth audio and Bluetooth calling support. Anything else is fluff.
Reverse camera is nice, too
they basically kill the car stereo and install scene, back in the 90 to like 2010 you could easly do alot of car stereo mods I mean alot, but then they started to put this screen with car functions embeded on them like AC etc. so you can't exchange them for what you want.
