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We got a new car. It comes with a touch screen instead of physical controls. We really wanted to avoid the screen, but ended up settling on the least offensiv

We got a new car. It comes with a touch screen instead of physical controls. We really wanted to avoid the screen, but ended up settling on the least offensive / most likely usable for us car vehicle. There was nothing out there in new car land that we liked. It is no longer safe doing simple things such as turning on/off recirculation. We like fresher air, so generally want recirculation off. However, it is not uncommon to see a truck in front of us suddenly belch a lot of smoke. In the old car, this was no problem. Push the recirc button and keep the bad stuff from getting into the car. In the new car, that would require hitting the correct button near the bottom of the screen to cause it to bring up the environmental controls, and then hitting the right button near the now top of the screen to toggle the recirc. Totally unsafe when in traffic. Add to that the settings that don't stay set every time you turn off the car, requiring manually going through and setting things up - it's not only unsafe but horrible.

CamperBob2 3y ago
... and yet, you still bought the car. I think I see the problem.
boredumb 3y ago
It's amazing how car manufacturers have captured the frustration of navigating through your locked mobile device to do something arbitrary while driving and embedded that experience directly into the dashboard.
- elzbardico 3y ago
  We have laws against using phones while driving for very good reasons everyone understands. And then car manufacturers decide to make turning Air Condition on and off into a experience as much distracting as using a smartphones, so they can save a couple hundred dollars in a 30.000 dollars vehicle. And because accidents caused by stupid car UIs are not as obvious an newsworthy as texting and driving, no politician has decided out that pushing for legislation for tactile controls can give him votes, so, nothing is done, legislation-wise, to curb this practice.
  - tivert 3y ago
    > And then car manufacturers decide to make turning Air Condition on and off into a experience as much distracting as using a smartphones, so they can save a couple hundred dollars in a 30.000 dollars vehicle. Do they really save "a couple of hundred dollars" by replacing physical controls with touchscreens? I would guess they'd save less than a hundred per car. Making serious user compromises to save a few pennies is totally something companies do, but I think they touchscreen fad is a bit more complicated than that. I think there's also an aesthetic factor, where they're chasing a "minimalist" and "high tech" look--which in recent years has meant flat surfaces and screens. IMHO, it would help a lot of buttons and knobs start to be seen as a kind of desirable luxury feature instead of "old fashioned."
    - toast0 3y ago
      I'd guess it's closer to one hundred than multiple hundreds, but if you fully replace the HVAC controls with touchscreen controls, you save money on a bunch of things: hvac controller has fewer pins; you don't need to supply the buttons / knobs; you don't need to design, build, and install the wiring, harness and connectors for the buttons; you don't need to provide a hole for the buttons and mounting facilities behind the hole for them; you don't need to provide a trim for around the buttons; etc, etc. Buttons cost money for each unit sold, stuffing the functionality into a touch screen interface that you're almost certainly going to have anyway only costs R&D money (and owner frustration, but if everyone is doing it....). My favorite though is buttons that only work when the touch screen feels like it; my Fiat Chrysler van has those for HVAC, you can press the temperature up or down buttons, and it'll queue the keypresses until it's ready to use them; sometimes many seconds later.
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
    - bluGill 3y ago
      Cars never bought the cheap buttons as they wear out too quick. So each button is $.50 each for a good button. Then the have $3 of wire added to the wiring harness. Add $.20 for the connectors (they use the more expensive sealed connectors now). Each button is installed by hand on the car, so add some cost for labor. It all adds up. Note that while I don't know the actual costs of the above, I think the above numbers are reasonable. A touch screen is $100 or less in the quantity they buy, and it comes as an assembly that replaces the radio they have to install anyway. GM sold 6 million cars last year. If they can save one dollar on each that is $6 million dollars to the bottom line.
beachy 3y ago
Our new Hyundai Ioniq 5 does this. It's a beautiful vehicle on many ways. But as so often, the desire to use touch controls has compromised the ability to drive without taking eyes off the road The most egregious example is turning off the climate control. I need to look down and locate the "fan down" control, which is small and on a touch screen with no tactile features, then click it repeatedly until reaching zero and the air stops. Piss poor design and dangerous for one of the most frequently performed tasks.
everybodyknows 3y ago
I find it interesting that America's product liability attorneys, the same who got the Piper Cub declared an unsafe design and more or less shut down the light aircraft industry, are so utterly ineffectual against the vastly more pervasive threat to public safety of such eyes-off-the-road design perversions applied to essential controls.

CamperBob2 3y ago

... and yet, you still bought the car. I think I see the problem.

boredumb 3y ago

It's amazing how car manufacturers have captured the frustration of navigating through your locked mobile device to do something arbitrary while driving and embedded that experience directly into the dashboard.

elzbardico 3y ago
We have laws against using phones while driving for very good reasons everyone understands. And then car manufacturers decide to make turning Air Condition on and off into a experience as much distracting as using a smartphones, so they can save a couple hundred dollars in a 30.000 dollars vehicle. And because accidents caused by stupid car UIs are not as obvious an newsworthy as texting and driving, no politician has decided out that pushing for legislation for tactile controls can give him votes, so, nothing is done, legislation-wise, to curb this practice.
- tivert 3y ago
  > And then car manufacturers decide to make turning Air Condition on and off into a experience as much distracting as using a smartphones, so they can save a couple hundred dollars in a 30.000 dollars vehicle. Do they really save "a couple of hundred dollars" by replacing physical controls with touchscreens? I would guess they'd save less than a hundred per car. Making serious user compromises to save a few pennies is totally something companies do, but I think they touchscreen fad is a bit more complicated than that. I think there's also an aesthetic factor, where they're chasing a "minimalist" and "high tech" look--which in recent years has meant flat surfaces and screens. IMHO, it would help a lot of buttons and knobs start to be seen as a kind of desirable luxury feature instead of "old fashioned."
  - toast0 3y ago
    I'd guess it's closer to one hundred than multiple hundreds, but if you fully replace the HVAC controls with touchscreen controls, you save money on a bunch of things: hvac controller has fewer pins; you don't need to supply the buttons / knobs; you don't need to design, build, and install the wiring, harness and connectors for the buttons; you don't need to provide a hole for the buttons and mounting facilities behind the hole for them; you don't need to provide a trim for around the buttons; etc, etc. Buttons cost money for each unit sold, stuffing the functionality into a touch screen interface that you're almost certainly going to have anyway only costs R&D money (and owner frustration, but if everyone is doing it....). My favorite though is buttons that only work when the touch screen feels like it; my Fiat Chrysler van has those for HVAC, you can press the temperature up or down buttons, and it'll queue the keypresses until it's ready to use them; sometimes many seconds later.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
  - bluGill 3y ago
    Cars never bought the cheap buttons as they wear out too quick. So each button is $.50 each for a good button. Then the have $3 of wire added to the wiring harness. Add $.20 for the connectors (they use the more expensive sealed connectors now). Each button is installed by hand on the car, so add some cost for labor. It all adds up. Note that while I don't know the actual costs of the above, I think the above numbers are reasonable. A touch screen is $100 or less in the quantity they buy, and it comes as an assembly that replaces the radio they have to install anyway. GM sold 6 million cars last year. If they can save one dollar on each that is $6 million dollars to the bottom line.

beachy 3y ago

Our new Hyundai Ioniq 5 does this. It's a beautiful vehicle on many ways. But as so often, the desire to use touch controls has compromised the ability to drive without taking eyes off the road The most egregious example is turning off the climate control. I need to look down and locate the "fan down" control, which is small and on a touch screen with no tactile features, then click it repeatedly until reaching zero and the air stops. Piss poor design and dangerous for one of the most frequently performed tasks.

everybodyknows 3y ago

I find it interesting that America's product liability attorneys, the same who got the Piper Cub declared an unsafe design and more or less shut down the light aircraft industry, are so utterly ineffectual against the vastly more pervasive threat to public safety of such eyes-off-the-road design perversions applied to essential controls.