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Franco Caution posted:Has anyone messed around with Cadillac CUE? Yeah I test-drive an ATS last year and I got to play around with CUE a bit. Without a doubt, it was the most obtuse, idiotically designed piece of automotive technology I've ever experienced other than MyFordTouch. CUE has a "feature" that the screen senses when a hand is near it and will change the buttons and displays accordingly. Unfortunately, it always changes to something useless or needlessly complicated, making an operation that should be a simple one-button press turns into a menu-browsing multi-press affair...that is, if you even get what you wanted in the first place. I found it not only unintuitive and distracting, it's downright dangerous at times. Whomever designed it and signed off on it should be stuffed in a potato sack and beat with hammers. As much as people laugh at Porsche with their "blizzard of buttons" user interface, it makes a lot of sense. Coming from an aviation background, anything you to need to use frequently or in an emergency is only a flip of a switch or a twist of a knob away - it's simply good ergonomics.
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Jun 19, 2013 03:36
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Franco Caution posted:Has anyone messed around with Cadillac CUE? I've driven an XTS and an ATS with CUE. It worked better than I thought it would. The screens are well organized and logical, and the screen elements are sized well. The voice control is hands down (  ) the best in the industry. No need to memorize vocabulary words, just tell it what you want it to do. I liked the feature where the menu provided more detail as your hand hovered over each icon, but some people would like to turn it off, I'm sure. The haptic response helps tremendously, but also highlights the biggest problem. It's too slow to respond. So you end up doing what you wanted, and something extra because it didn't respond as quickly as it should have. It also means you're probably on a different screen than the one you wanted. I think with some refinement, CUE has tremendous potential. Especially for secondary controls. For primarys (volume, tune, temp, fan) give me knobs, please. Goober Peas fucked around with this message at 03:47 on Jun 19, 2013 |
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Jun 19, 2013 03:36
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Temp and blower control should be on knobs/switches, Volume and channel select should be knobs or buttons as well, and none of those take up much space. Most other stuff can put on a touch screen I guess.
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Jun 19, 2013 03:47
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D C posted:Temp and blower control should be on knobs/switches, Volume and channel select should be knobs or buttons as well, and none of those take up much space. It'd be sweet if they'd just put all that poo poo on buttons and knobs on the steering like an F1 car
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Jun 19, 2013 04:11
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Why do people defend MyTouch? Is there a better version out there or something? I had it in a 2013 Focus rental and it was unintuitive, slow, and ugly. Every single part of the system made me ask "Who thought this was a good idea?" It took me five minutes just sitting there delving through menus that only display one item at a time like some 80s VCR, despite being on a high-resolution LCD, just to get the drat thing to switch to USB audio input. Once this mistake was made it would conveniently lock the music controls on the phone, requiring me to use the awful car controls to pick a song. Most of the time I'd just pick a playlist on the phone and then not touch it anymore because the controls were so bad, and this is coming from someone that used one of those crappy old "iPod integrated" radios with a 2-line VFD display in early 2000. It's worse than those. Everything was buried under several sub-menus that I can't even remember anymore because it didn't make any sense. Apparently just having it as an input like the radio or CD would have been too complex. Just to make it even more annoying, if you either removed the phone before turning off the car or didn't plug the phone in before starting it up, it would go back to audio cable input requiring another trip back to 1985. Usually I'm drat good at figuring out even the most obtuse, engrish awful interfaces even on cheap lovely chinese motherboard BIOSes. Somehow MyTouch is even more frustrating. If I have serious trouble with it, most people aren't going to be able to do poo poo with it. My mother gave up trying to use it almost immediately, and she's been a computer programmer for nearly 30 years. The rest of the car was actually pretty drat good, but everything in the center console completely ruined it.
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Jun 19, 2013 05:42
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Where have you seen people defending it? Aside from Ford and Microsoft press releases that is.
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Jun 19, 2013 05:48
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PeterWeller posted:Where have you seen people defending it? Aside from Ford and Microsoft press releases that is. Seen it in a bunch of reviews, although you're right they aren't much different than a Ford or Microsoft press release. My favorite part about it is that while driving you have no less than four Microsoft logos in your vision, just so you never forget who is responsible for the blight upon your vehicle.
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Jun 19, 2013 06:02
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Previa_fun posted:I really don't understand the appeal of the Versa/Sonic/Fiesta sedans. Is it hatchback phobia or want of a separate trunk? Both? In a cold climate you can access the trunk of a sedan without losing all the heat from the passenger cabin.
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Jun 19, 2013 06:20
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Sudo Echo posted:Seen it in a bunch of reviews, although you're right they aren't much different than a Ford or Microsoft press release. Huh. I haven't read a review that didn't spend at least a paragraph bemoaning it.
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Jun 19, 2013 06:24
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PeterWeller posted:Where have you seen people defending it? Aside from Ford and Microsoft press releases that is. MyFordTouch is so bad that it doesn't even work outside the car in a totally stationary environment. They had a bunch of MFT consoles set up at the last auto show; even standing over top of it, the touchscreen would hardly respond to input, and my brother had his freeze up inexplicably. The real tragedy is that Sync, the system it replaced, worked really well.
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Jun 19, 2013 06:27
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Does anyone happen to know how similar their system is to the Microsoft UVO system they put in Kia's? I have that and I would definitely prefer more buttons, less touchscreen, and I can think of quite a few behavioral changes I'd make to the software. Nothing that couldn't be fixed with a simple firmware update that I'm sure will never happen. I was just curious if the UVO was sort of a toned down version that handles less than Ford's system or if they were developed completely separately and don't share any code.
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Jun 19, 2013 06:47
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MrChips posted:MyFordTouch is so bad that it doesn't even work outside the car in a totally stationary environment. They had a bunch of MFT consoles set up at the last auto show; even standing over top of it, the touchscreen would hardly respond to input, and my brother had his freeze up inexplicably. Every time I wish my car had a cool infotainment system, I read something like this and am glad I have a basic stereo with a RCA jack.
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Jun 19, 2013 06:49
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The lovely thing about MFT is that underneath all the crap it's just running Windows CE, which is probably pretty stable. From what I read, the MFT software was outsourced to some company (BSquare) and they just did a horrible job. It's too bad it's not more open, I bet some customers could make better software.
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Jun 19, 2013 07:14
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MrChips posted:Coming from an aviation background, anything you to need to use frequently or in an emergency is only a flip of a switch or a twist of a knob away - it's simply good ergonomics. I would love to see an updated chapter in Raskin's The Humane Interface dedicated to touchscreen controls in cars. Had he not passed from pancreatic cancer, it would have been the easier chapter he's ever written: "WHAT THE poo poo, DID YOU NOT READ ANYTHING IN THIS BOOK?! GO TO HELL, AUTOMAKERS."
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Jun 19, 2013 13:12
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Honda/Acura seems to be sticking with buttons, as are Buick, which hasn't adopted the crazy GM stuff presumably because they are mostly rebadged Opels.
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Jun 19, 2013 14:17
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SouthLAnd posted:The lovely thing about MFT is that underneath all the crap it's just running Windows CE, which is probably pretty stable. From what I read, the MFT software was outsourced to some company (BSquare) and they just did a horrible job. This is the most praise I've ever heard for WinCE
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Jun 19, 2013 15:32
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PeterWeller posted:Every time I wish my car had a cool infotainment system, I read something like this and am glad I have a basic stereo with a RCA jack. I don't know, I think they hit a near-perfect balance with SYNC, mainly because it just stays the gently caress out of the way if you don't want to deal with it. The voice commands work well, the simple bog-standard radio display is clear and easy to understand, and both Bluetooth and USB connectivity work 98% of the time. I have the occasional problem with the car not recognizing a nearby phone (perhaps 1 in 50 times), and iPods connected to the USB won't work if the car's parked outside for a long period in the cold, but that's because iPods don't enjoy being frozen. The HVAC controls are all buttons and knobs, and all stereo functionality could be accessed through buttons alone if you want to. The real piss-off is that they took this excellent system, which pretty much everyone I've talked to really liked, and replaced it with utter poo poo. Why, why did they do that?
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Jun 19, 2013 15:37
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PT6A posted:I don't know, I think they hit a near-perfect balance with SYNC, mainly because it just stays the gently caress out of the way if you don't want to deal with it. The voice commands work well, the simple bog-standard radio display is clear and easy to understand, and both Bluetooth and USB connectivity work 98% of the time. I have the occasional problem with the car not recognizing a nearby phone (perhaps 1 in 50 times), and iPods connected to the USB won't work if the car's parked outside for a long period in the cold, but that's because iPods don't enjoy being frozen. The HVAC controls are all buttons and knobs, and all stereo functionality could be accessed through buttons alone if you want to. It's like the third gen Taurus all over again.
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Jun 19, 2013 15:46
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The MFT system in our 2012 Explorer has been pretty solid. If you're loving around in the menu's while driving your using it wrong, you push the voice button and say "USB AUDIO". It's not that hard. Everything else I can control with the direction pads on the steering wheel and the two smaller LCD's in the instrument panel. I remember having 2 issues with it before the last 2 firmware upgrades. One time we lost the Sync system while driving, totally unresponsive and black screen. It was fine after turning the car off and back on again. The other time it somehow connected to the wifi at a McDonalds while we were in the drive through and decided it would be a good time to auto upgrade the firmware or something. I have no idea how that happened. We haven't had any issues since the last 2 firmware releases though. If I had one gripe with the system, is the rear climate controls are one menu too deep to get at. We don't change them often, but it's annoying when we have to. I have the normal SYNC system in my 2011 Fusion and it works really well too. It's not as fancy for sure, but I don't use it for much other than switching to bluetooth audio while driving or talking on the phone.
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Jun 19, 2013 16:45
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davebo posted:Does anyone happen to know how similar their system is to the Microsoft UVO system they put in Kia's? I have that and I would definitely prefer more buttons, less touchscreen, and I can think of quite a few behavioral changes I'd make to the software. Nothing that couldn't be fixed with a simple firmware update that I'm sure will never happen. I was just curious if the UVO was sort of a toned down version that handles less than Ford's system or if they were developed completely separately and don't share any code. It must not be too similar because i've yet to hear anywhere near the same sort of negative feedback from UVO that I have from fords systems. Also the 2014 uvo eservices nav system is really good and really easy to use. Can't wait until its in all our cars.
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Jun 19, 2013 16:54
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my friend's mustang has sync and it was pretty cool when you wanted it and pretty much disappeared when you didn't want to use any of the features. I've got a rental 328 bmw this week and I am really enjoying the center knob instead of a touch screen. better and safer. I don't enjoy needing some kind of weird aux-usb connection cable for an ipod and that I cant use the usb connection to stream spotify from my phone but I am guessing there is an options package that lets you bluetooth connect. Or if I owned the car just buy an aux-in bluetooth device.
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Jun 19, 2013 17:11
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Xguard86 posted:I've got a rental 328 bmw this week and I am really enjoying the center knob instead of a touch screen. better and safer. I remember when the iDrive system was the bane of car reviewers everywhere; seems like these days BMW's got it pretty well sorted out compared to everything else.
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Jun 19, 2013 17:17
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Fucknag posted:I remember when the iDrive system was the bane of car reviewers everywhere; seems like these days BMW's got it pretty well sorted out compared to everything else. I think the initial iterations of it had some buggy software just like the Ford system did, and being the first in the world with that sort of thing (came out on the 7 series first) it was kind of expected. Moreover, I think car reviewers hated it because a lot of it wasn't very easy to use or intuitive for someone getting in to the car the first time. These people were missing the point though, because why should a car's UI be easy to use or intuitive? A car is something that you might be spending time in every day for a number of years, you're still you and the car is still the car, you'll have plenty of time to really learn how to use the system and really get good at it iDrive's priority was first and foremost to make it so that an experienced operator can use it quickly and efficiently, minimizing the amount of time and attention needed. It wasn't meant to make sense to an 8 year old, because 8 year olds don't drive BMWs and even if they did, it doesn't need to be completely clear and intuitive on the very first day because it assumes the operator will make an effort to learn how it works just like the rest of the car.
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Jun 19, 2013 17:28
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ya it only moves in two directions so no weird north south or diagonal movements that pissed people off in the first version. They also give you buttons clustered around the knob so you can jump right to the radio or whatever which cuts down on menu hopping for simple things. All the climate control stuff is separate as well which is sometimes actually a negative since its easier to reach that big center knob than mess with the little ones on the dash. Its a rental model so no navi or anything beyond basic features to mess with, no idea if that stuff works well or if it gets bogged down. It does come with the owner's manual loaded into the system which is really nice when you're first getting acquainted with the car. I couldn't figure out how to get the seat to remember my adjustments so I pulled up the manual at a redlight and knew what to do before it turned green. I am also a young tech-savy person so I'm probably not the best source but I found it intuitive enough not to be annoying and after 2 days it felt natural to spin and slide around menus. I would imagine, if I drove it long enough, many things would become muscle memory in a way you never really get on touchscreens.
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Jun 19, 2013 17:35
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I quite enjoy using the MyLink system in my Sonic (hatch! what, no love?  ). Dedicated (touch) volume, power, and home buttons and they didn't cram any other systems into it (temperature is all knobs and buttons). I just got the update that gave it official iOS/Siri support (it supported it before albeit in different ways) and still works great. I really want to know if GM will allow the "iOS in the Car" feature from iOS7 to actually work. That'd be a huge deal for me.
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Jun 19, 2013 18:44
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SouthLAnd posted:The lovely thing about MFT is that underneath all the crap it's just running Windows CE, which is probably pretty stable. From what I read, the MFT software was outsourced to some company (BSquare) and they just did a horrible job. Oh jesus, BSquare. I wish I could say more but NDAs prevent me. What a horrible company. Never, ever, ever outsource your software to them.
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Jun 19, 2013 19:03
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Car companies should just put a contest online to design the best in-car system with the reward being a job or a fat bounty to the winning team. Maybe let them design the physical input based on a dimensions spec or work that out and then have them build the software. As a bonus, it would attract attention from the younger generation that has stopped buying cars.
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Jun 19, 2013 19:33
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Xguard86 posted:Car companies should just put a contest online to design the best in-car system with the reward being a job or a fat bounty to the winning team. Maybe let them design the physical input based on a dimensions spec or work that out and then have them build the software. As a bonus, it would attract attention from the younger generation that has stopped buying cars. The problem isn't that the software designs are bad per se, it's that the implementations tend to be awful laggy poo poo. Apple made a touchscreen UI that ran on a phone in 2007 with a day of battery life and was responsive and fast; carmakers today can't seem to do that even though they have six years of technology improvements and don't have to make the entire package fit in a pocket (removing power and volume constraints).
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Jun 19, 2013 20:03
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Look carmakers: Knobs. Buttons. Operable while wearing gloves, more important stuff goes nearer where your hands fall from the main controls.
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Jun 19, 2013 20:17
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I'm not sure if it's a factor of the car companies trying to design electronics to last a 10+ year car lifetime while Apple only has to have their stuff last 3 years, but the hardware that goes into a lot of these systems is woefully obsolete by smartphone standards even when new. Certifying electronic components and designs for car heat/vibration conditions isn't exactly like mil-spec but it does take some time and effort. The touchscreen stuff exploded because it let car companies throw in 10 bucks of parts and charge you $1000 extra for nav. That subsidizes a tremendous amount of other expensive stuff most customers aren't really willing to pay for. The problem is, car companies can't put a 4" screen right in the driver's line of sight like everyone does with aftermarket units for liability reasons, so to compensate for having to put it in the dash where it's hard to see, they have to make the screens bigger and bigger, and not only are bigger touchscreens more expensive but they end up eating the dash space ergonomic HVAC etc controls need.
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Jun 19, 2013 20:23
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Cocoa Crispies posted:The problem isn't that the software designs are bad per se, it's that the implementations tend to be awful laggy poo poo. Apple made a touchscreen UI that ran on a phone in 2007 with a day of battery life and was responsive and fast; carmakers today can't seem to do that even though they have six years of technology improvements and don't have to make the entire package fit in a pocket (removing power and volume constraints). You are looking at this from the wrong angle. Apple can afford to stop shipping and stop supporting devices that are a year old because their customers accept it, so they are always using the newest technology. Automakers spent years developing a car, sell it for a number of years, then have to support it for several years after they stop selling it. The software folks are probably trying to match the Apple look and feel of today using decade old hardware.
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Jun 19, 2013 20:52
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I can't wait for the combination of HUD + gaze recognition to become mainstream. That will simplify the interface enough for us to devote 100% of our complaints to menu order and layout.
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Jun 19, 2013 21:07
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Brigdh posted:You are looking at this from the wrong angle. Apple can afford to stop shipping and stop supporting devices that are a year old because their customers accept it, so they are always using the newest technology. Automakers spent years developing a car, sell it for a number of years, then have to support it for several years after they stop selling it. The software folks are probably trying to match the Apple look and feel of today using decade old hardware. People would be fine if they matched the iPhone feel from 2007. Many of the touchscreen systems that suck a lot are brand new or post-2010. I'd consider that it's an economic/product management choice: a touchscreen entertainment system in a car is a checkbox, and not a qualitative thing to customers. People want navigation more than they want navigation that doesn't suck, in other words.
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Jun 19, 2013 21:14
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Zorak of Michigan posted:I can't wait for the combination of HUD + gaze recognition to become mainstream. That will simplify the interface enough for us to devote 100% of our complaints to menu order and layout. Why would gaze recognition be a good thing? Just leave the displays on all the time. HUDs won't happen anytime soon because it's way more expensive and tricky to have a HUD that functions well in all lighting conditions and doesn't alienate users versus an instrument panel that honestly hasn't changed much in 30 years and works perfectly fine.
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Jun 19, 2013 21:16
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Cocoa Crispies posted:People would be fine if they matched the iPhone feel from 2007. Many of the touchscreen systems that suck a lot are brand new or post-2010. I'd consider that it's an economic/product management choice: a touchscreen entertainment system in a car is a checkbox, and not a qualitative thing to customers. People want navigation more than they want navigation that doesn't suck, in other words. I still think you are missing the point. The hardware that automanufacturers have access to is not capable of that. The auto systems suck because you are comparing them to your phone because thats the experience you want, but auto manufactures can't get phone hardware. If GM went to Apple, and asked for a million iPads, and guaranteed parts/support for the next 15 years, Apple would say gently caress no. Apple would be willing to sell the million iPads today, but would not guarantee future supply or support. Its not just Apple, either. Intel, Nvidia, Samsung, and Qualcomm would do the exact same thing.
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Jun 19, 2013 21:53
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Brigdh posted:I still think you are missing the point. The hardware that automanufacturers have access to is not capable of that. The auto systems suck because you are comparing them to your phone because thats the experience you want, but auto manufactures can't get phone hardware. If GM went to Apple, and asked for a million iPads, and guaranteed parts/support for the next 15 years, Apple would say gently caress no. Apple would be willing to sell the million iPads today, but would not guarantee future supply or support. Its not just Apple, either. Intel, Nvidia, Samsung, and Qualcomm would do the exact same thing. Actually, Intel, Samsung, and Qualcomm will definitely sell you SoCs with long support guarantees, as will Freescale, TI, and basically any other company with a chip portfolio. I wouldn't be surprised if most of the touchscreen systems released in the last couple years ran hardware that was several times faster than the iPhone from six years ago. It's the weak-sauce software because nobody cares enough to make it better.
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Jun 19, 2013 22:16
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Cocoa Crispies posted:Actually, Intel, Samsung, and Qualcomm will definitely sell you SoCs with long support guarantees, as will Freescale, TI, and basically any other company with a chip portfolio. I wouldn't be surprised if most of the touchscreen systems released in the last couple years ran hardware that was several times faster than the iPhone from six years ago. It's the weak-sauce software because nobody cares enough to make it better. Not quite. For instance, here's a review of the latest version of MyFordTouch: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ford-focus-infotainment-sync-myford,3206-2.html It uses a Freescale i.MX516 SoC from architecture originally released in 2009. And the 516 is an underclocked automotive version of that architecture. quote:i.MX515 (consumer/industrial) = 800 MHz ARM Cortex A8 platform (600 MHz for industrial) + HD VPU + 3D GPU + 2.5D GPU + IPU + security  So really, it is basically a downgraded smartphone from 4-6 years ago.
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Jun 19, 2013 22:31
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Cocoa Crispies posted:Actually, Intel, Samsung, and Qualcomm will definitely sell you SoCs with long support guarantees, as will Freescale, TI, and basically any other company with a chip portfolio. I wouldn't be surprised if most of the touchscreen systems released in the last couple years ran hardware that was several times faster than the iPhone from six years ago. It's the weak-sauce software because nobody cares enough to make it better. Actually, not really. I work for one of those first three companies, and the long term support maxes out at 5 years, and its already a 5+ year old design. Not something that will compete with the state of the art chips that are in any smartphone released this year. TI killed their OMAP division, so they are not even really in the same industry anymore. Since this is starting to butt up against my work, I'm dropping out of the discussion
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Jun 19, 2013 22:40
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Brian Greenstone's rundown on the monumentally terrible interface in the Fisker Karma is always worth a watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rK8MqjagHu8
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Jun 19, 2013 22:45
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InitialDave posted:Brian Greenstone's rundown on the monumentally terrible interface in the Fisker Karma is always worth a watch: I never understood how the Karma had such good PR early on when critical looks at it revealed what a giant boondoggle it was, with zero real-world aspirations like Tesla has.
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Jun 19, 2013 22:51
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