Comment by angott
12 hours ago
> They want 60k for cars which have nothing in them. Other companies have now ripped the software and the iPad, so they have nothing unique
You are not wrong about Tesla's base models like the 3 and Y being light on traditional 60k car features, but the second part is much more debatable. With the exception of some Chinese car manufacturers, almost no Western car makers have managed to match Tesla's software stack.
I can't think of another car brand that makes its own silicon, ships OTA updates weekly, runs an in-house OS that isn't an outdated Android skin, and tightly integrates media, navigation, charging, and energy management all in the same platform. Most legacy automakers still rely on their old infotainment vendors, release update slowly (if at all!), and struggle with fragmented software architectures. Their driver assistance systems are improving very slowly, and they are behind Tesla even for basic features like lane-keep assist. And that's even before getting into self-driving ambitions, where no brand has been able to ship anything similar AFAIK.
Rivian and Lucid are closer philosophically and technically, but they're still quite tiny players compared to Tesla, and haven't proven they can execute at Tesla's volume and pricing.
Seriously, I don't need my car to get weekly OTA updates. And my 8yr old nissan qashqai had lane assist, it's hardly revolutionary. Tesla is pretty much dead in Europe, mainly due to Musks personality, but the quality of its product is also poor.
Some other brands rely on Mobileye for driver assistance. It’s clear from demos that Mobileye is on the same level as Tesla, the difference is that the don’t use end users as beta testers. I suspect that when actual full self driving is possible, other car companies won’t be as far behind as you’d think based on the features Tesla has in their cars now.
They mostly only work on pre-mapped highways. They're also not commercially available.
There's currently no other DA other than Tesla's FSD available in the US that will work on city streets and highways.
I'm going to assert that Tesla's FSD™ does not, in fact work on city streets and highways.
Or, if you want to loosely define "work", Ernst Dickmanns had self driving in the 80s, and put in on the autobahn in the 90s. I'd rather define it more tightly as "statistically at least as safe to be in _and_ to be near, as a human driver".
Tesla claims to have achieved that, but I don't believe them. That's because the data they report 1) omits a fair bit of critical info, and 2) frequently changes definitions. Both serve to make comparisons difficult. If it was clearly safe, I think they'd put effort into making the comparison transparent.
Bear in mind that Musk has been claiming "Full Self-Driving" since at least 2016, and people involved have asserted that he wasn't wrong, he was lying.
Rivian recently moved away from mobileye in their newer models, because mobileye is are far behind and limited. The progression of their new in house driver assistance since then is already proving that was a good choice.
My personal bet is on nvidia. They always show advanced selfdriving capabilities based on ML.
They are also forefront of ml simulation. 3D, weather pattern etc.
Tesla also had plenty of missshapes like Dojo or cybertruck and the sitll not finished FSD.
My Car OS from Ford Mustang Mach-e works completly fine. No clue why this is some advantage Tesla should have? BMW just launched their new Gen 6 incl. their new os.
All the advantages of that fully integrated 'platform' also just works in my car?
BMW is very good in lane keeping, Mercedes can drive more km in germany autonomes than BMW and BMW can drive more km than Tesla.
I of course focus on german brands because i'm from germany. But XPeng and others working on all of that too.
why are they making cars at all of the software is what they are good at?
> I can't think of another car brand that makes its own silicon, ships OTA updates weekly, runs an in-house OS that isn't an outdated Android skin, and tightly integrates media, navigation, charging, and energy management all in the same platform.
VW (ID software 3/4/5), Mercedes (MBUX).
They don't update weekly (I don't think so, anyway), but I don't see how that would be inherently positive. They should be able to update weekly (e.g. security patches), sure, but car software should probably not be changing week-to-week for years on end.
That being said, since the US is basically a captive and stagnating market for EVs now, it seems most models from European makers are not available in the US anyway.
Why do cars need weekly software updates? Or - more specifically, what sorts of new software-enabled features (or bug fixes) besides FSD are rolling out weekly in Teslas? Genuinely curious! Is there downtime?
A couple of recent software additions to my ‘23 MY: * Dynamic speed profiles for Autopilot/FSD
* The ability to specify individual drop-off locations for FSD arrivals (curbside, parking lot, driveway, etc)
* Grok as a voice assistant for the infotainment system
* iOS live activity viewer for the Dog Mode camera feed
* Speed/steering/control statuses being overlaid on dashcam footage
* “Santa Mode” which revamps the UI with Christmas theming for the holiday season
* Automatic HOV lane routing based on vehicle occupancy status
* Vehicle alerts/chimes when exiting, if leaving your phone within the vehicle
* Location-based individual charge limits
* 3D visualizations of supercharger locations, synced with active availability/occupancy per stall
* The SpaceX docking simulator ported as an in-vehicle game, playable on the infotainment screen
These are all additions from just the most recent update, and I can confidently say this is the only vehicle I’ve had that consistently gets better and better in terms of its software features over the course of ownership. Each update takes anywhere from 20-45 minutes during which, unfortunately, you’re not able to utilize the vehicle at all.
Can you imagine an ICE vehicle having "Location-based fill-up limits" or "3D visualizations of gas station locations, synced with active availability / occupancy per stall" ? And of course, such useful features as a spacex docking simulator, which every vehicle needs (I guess).
And you wonder why Tesla is heading the way of the dodo? Wasting the SW talent to deliver drek.
1 reply →
I own a Mustang Mach-E and I do not want to have weekly updates to my car software.
If you look at your updates, the FSD one is clearly a beta thing now for so long, of course you need to update regularly if you still change that much. Btw. Musk said 2014 that FSD will allow you to sleep in your Car while driving in 2023. Soooo?
Something like Grok was also added OTA in my Ford car. So yes they can do it apparently too.
Everything else just feels like gimicks I wouldn't want to have. I drive my car i do not play with my car. My car is not a gimmick.
Okay I was sceptical going in but those updates seem legit.
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> Why do cars need weekly software updates?
Because musk has been over promising and under delivering for years. What do you want to bet those updates still haven't put the "self driving" in FSD? Classic bait and switch. They give you a little thread of hope that one day your car will be better, and give you goofy infotainment features instead of autonomous driving.
Mercedes appears to have the best infotainment system, but it's not a US company.