this post was submitted on 05 Mar 2024
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Tesla's Model 3 uses a touchscreen for damn near everything. Some things are buried and require multiple presses in different places on the screen. It looks really good, but the actual purpose and the fact that humans driving at potentially deadly speeds need to operate it seems to have been placed a distant second to safety when the thing was designed. Given who is in charge of Tesla it's not much of a surprise.
I'd never realized how convenient/natural a joystick is for adjusting your side mirrors. I'm not even sure my wife has the reach to both press a touchscreen in the center console and have her head in driving position to adjust the mirrors with real time feedback. Even I'd hate to have to tweak a mirror while driving with a touchscreen.
Its mainly touchscreen due to two reasons: 1. Touchscreens are significantly cheaper than analog controls. 2. Touchscreens support the 'publish now, debug later' approach of Tesla and a lot of Chinese car manufacturers.
it *used to look good, but then they fired the former-apple designer and hired some hack who worked on android, and it looks god awful
before: https://www.teslarati.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/model-3-ui-1.jpg
after: https://miro.medium.com/v2/resize:fit:1400/format:webp/1*zNdNui2-s30EEAqCDy8vRA.jpeg
Neither of those options look at all appealing to me
Spoken like an Apple fan. 🙂
I think they both look nice, but I wouldn't want to have to actually use either of them, especially while driving a car.
This is an excellent example of why Steve Jobs was right to make Bill Atkinson add rounded rectangles to Mac OS
Of the two, the second looks easier to use. The first looks like everything is buried under "child-safe" menus you have to dig through to do anything. That said, they both kind of suck.
Just because they look all bubbly doesn't mean it's a better UI.
Not saying it's for everyone, but if it's not accessible from the home screen with a single press I can do without looking I'd rather just use the voice controls to keep my hands on the wheel and eyes on the road.
For someone who's the primary driver of a vehicle that's a good option, but there are plenty of Teslas out there that get driven often by secondary drivers who aren't familiar with the specific voice commands and IMO aren't going to learn them. Some standardization for controls is a good thing and although physical controls can vary, they're usually enough alike to easily figure them out. That's not going to happen with a touch screen.
I’d like a couple more physical controls, but I think you’re making it sound worse than it really is. I also don’t think the issue only is touch screen vs physical controls. Modern cars are a lot more complex - they have a lot more features.
I went for a few years renting higher end cars on a regular basis. The primary functions on every single one of the "modern cars" were easy to figure out with the exception of the Teslas. For occasional use Tesla's controls are absurdly cumbersome verging on dangerous.
I can understand your experience would be different if it's your primary ride.
I can of course only speak for myself and what I have experienced with others in our TM3. When we (my wife and I) got it 5 years ago, neither of us had ever driven a TM3 before. We had a Ford C-max before. My wife got the honour of driving it home from the delivery center and I of course drove it a bit later. Quite a few friends and family tried it in the weeks after. I don’t recall anyone finding it cumbersome or hard to drive.
I do find it stupid that Tesla had removed the stalks on the refreshed TM3 and I welcome the Euro NCAP changes, that will likely have an effect.
It's tech on wheel, so safety is always second.