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If you want the simplest car possible, you can look at models designed to sell in volume worldwide. I'm talking the Hyundai Venue crossover, Hyundai Accent sub

If you want the simplest car possible, you can look at models designed to sell in volume worldwide. I'm talking the Hyundai Venue crossover, Hyundai Accent subcompact sedan, Honda Fit/Jazz hatchback (recently discontinued for the US), Ford EcoSport crossover, etc. They are designed to be serviced in poor conditions. They will tolerate removal of electronics like the infotainment because some countries' base models have simpler configurations. In the case of the Honda Fit, the climate control dials physically move the ducts! And repair documentation and parts will be plentiful because there's a large market for parts suppliers to compete. Also look at body-on-frame fleet vehicles like a base Ford Ranger or F-150, but be ready to forgo stuff like cruise control. There are EV equivalents too, like the Chevy Bolt and Hyundai Kona EV that offer range in the 200s of miles with make driver assists as an optional upgrade. Even with complicated powertrain electronics, EVs are still more reliable than ICE cars because any iffy software is made up for by lack of mechanical parts. The repair procedure is the same as mechnical parts - just swap the faulty part out for a working one, and the "upstream" supplier will probably take the broken module to reflash software or frankenstein together half-working PCBs to make another refurbished module to sell. If you're worried about remote compromise, it's pretty easy to avoid IMO. Open the dashboard and yank the cellular antenna, and never pair the infotainment to Bluetooth or Wi-Fi (or just yank the 2.4 GHz antenna). Those are basically the only avenues for wireless attacks into a vehicle unless you count the TPMS and key fob radios, which seem too simple and low-bandwidth to offer an attack surface. And if an attacker can access your car's physical ports, they could already attack you in other ways like by weakening the brake lines. Other new electronics, like MOSFETS instead of relays in the BCM, have actually made the car more reliable so they should be fine. Other newly standard features like blind spot monitoring are (1) solid state, so they won't fail often and (2) tolerate failure or complete removal.

numpad0 5y ago
It’s so wrong that tech inclined wants cheapest models for the reason that those are objectively better. The entire car industry is going to go iPhone all over again.
- jfengel 5y ago
  They're not objectively better. They're more suited to what they want: a device with fewer features but more direct control. Lots of people want a car with more features, and don't wish to control it directly. They would rather have a solid-state device that can't be repaired, but doesn't need to be. They don't want to upgrade it themselves; ideally, they don't want it to need upgrades until they buy another one. But you've got it exactly right: many consumers want the car industry to go iPhone, for the same reason they want iPhones. That's neither objectively worse nor objectively better. The only objective thing is that a ton of consumers want it, because it suits their needs. And part of that is achieved by avoiding development by the kinds of techies who think that their preferences are objectively better.
  - elihu 5y ago
    Some people want their cars to be like iPhones, but is that really what's behind this? I mean, take TVs. Pretty much every TV has "smart TV" features embedded, to the point where it's hard to find one that doesn't. I suspect this is because the manufacturer gets some kind of kickback from streaming services to include their app and to show ads and to gather data about what people are watching and in the end it's actually cheaper to include an embedded processor than it is to leave it out and lose their kickbacks. Similarly, those "smart car" features can be monetized by collecting valuable data and introducing subtle suggestions on where to go. It's hard to imagine a car company seeing the kind of revenue that Facebook and Google pull in and not wanting to get in on that. And they can even justify it as good for their customers by saying "we need these computers to collect training data so the self-driving features we deploy in the future will be better and safer." I can imagine a future where "dumb car" features are actually luxury features. Only high-end cars lack the smart car features because it's cheaper to include them than leave them out. Maybe that already describes the present.
    - throwitaway1235 5y ago
      Nailed it.
- notJim 5y ago
thatfrenchguy 5y ago
> Hyundai Kona EV that offer range in the 200s of miles with make driver assists as an optional upgrade I have a base model Kona EV and it has a ton of driver assists. And they're pretty great frankly.

numpad0 5y ago

It’s so wrong that tech inclined wants cheapest models for the reason that those are objectively better. The entire car industry is going to go iPhone all over again.

jfengel 5y ago
They're not objectively better. They're more suited to what they want: a device with fewer features but more direct control. Lots of people want a car with more features, and don't wish to control it directly. They would rather have a solid-state device that can't be repaired, but doesn't need to be. They don't want to upgrade it themselves; ideally, they don't want it to need upgrades until they buy another one. But you've got it exactly right: many consumers want the car industry to go iPhone, for the same reason they want iPhones. That's neither objectively worse nor objectively better. The only objective thing is that a ton of consumers want it, because it suits their needs. And part of that is achieved by avoiding development by the kinds of techies who think that their preferences are objectively better.
- elihu 5y ago
  Some people want their cars to be like iPhones, but is that really what's behind this? I mean, take TVs. Pretty much every TV has "smart TV" features embedded, to the point where it's hard to find one that doesn't. I suspect this is because the manufacturer gets some kind of kickback from streaming services to include their app and to show ads and to gather data about what people are watching and in the end it's actually cheaper to include an embedded processor than it is to leave it out and lose their kickbacks. Similarly, those "smart car" features can be monetized by collecting valuable data and introducing subtle suggestions on where to go. It's hard to imagine a car company seeing the kind of revenue that Facebook and Google pull in and not wanting to get in on that. And they can even justify it as good for their customers by saying "we need these computers to collect training data so the self-driving features we deploy in the future will be better and safer." I can imagine a future where "dumb car" features are actually luxury features. Only high-end cars lack the smart car features because it's cheaper to include them than leave them out. Maybe that already describes the present.
  - throwitaway1235 5y ago
    Nailed it.
notJim 5y ago

thatfrenchguy 5y ago

> Hyundai Kona EV that offer range in the 200s of miles with make driver assists as an optional upgrade I have a base model Kona EV and it has a ton of driver assists. And they're pretty great frankly.