it's odd that you say that without having seen the competitor. This is evidence of belonging to a cult or being afraid of better things. Of course it's possible that the new one is shit, but I think I'll make my own mind up.
It's odd you go straight to a trope about a cult. If I'm happy with something I don't always have the time, energy, or interest to seek out something better.
It's completely unsurprising to expect the first generation of something like this, even if it was amazing, to have annoying flaws. Unfortunately, it doesn't sound amazing. Car companies have a long track record of disappointing infotainment systems and there's zero reason to expect anything better here. In fact, the problems in this article sound identical to the ones I had with Honda's most basic level infotainment system just a couple years ago. It would freeze and the only fix was turning off the car...a difficult solution on road trips. Asking the dealer about it, they said there was no update process for it--maybe a newer model year wouldn't have that issue?
>It would freeze and the only fix was turning off the car...a difficult solution on road trips.
Back in the days of manual transmissions, this wasn't so hard. I remember having to do this for some odd reason (don't remember) back in the 90s: just clutch in, turn off the ignition, restart the engine, clutch out.
On my most recent car which had an infotainment system, there was some kind of three-button combination you could press to reboot the system without restarting the car.
I was kind of expecting some magic button combination, too, but was told there wasn't one.
The car was actually a manual transmission and the thought did occur to me. My worry was something like steering lock or some other issue while trying that while driving down the road would cause a horrible accident.
It’s the same reason why people have car brand preferences in general. We don’t call someone preferring Volvo a cult member because they haven’t tried out several competitors. It’s just the way things are when you find something you know you enjoy. The power of knowing what you have is strong and isn’t necessarily about “politics”.
Also, let’s not pretend it’s not a little weird to have someone build a car in 2023 that doesn’t have CarPlay or Android Auto and isn’t firmly in the budget segment. It’s not only going to feel unusual, but market pressure for improvements on GM will be completely different if you use their custom system than something that is more standardized and used by orders of a magnitude more customers.
The “cult” thing might make sense if there were any history at all of GM, or really even any auto maker, making a better infotainment system than CarPlay. But it’s never happened.
Imagine GM were a home builder who suddenly said they will no longer sell any homes they build, only rent them out. You are free to sell your house with your 3% mortgage, and go back to renting, to see if you prefer it. But those who choose to continue owning are not in a “cult,” and they’d think you were making a pretty bad decision. And they’d almost certainly be right.
I'm guilty of calling Apple users cultists myself, but the idea that any car company, worst of all GM, could possibly make an in-house infotainment system that would be nearly as good as the very cheapest and worst Android or Apple phone is sheer lunacy. There is absolutely no evidence they can make anything decent, and a mountain of evidence that everything they've ever made has been utter trash.
I'm not part of a cult. I just have the foresight to realize it's cheaper to buy a new phone than it is a new car.
Knowing Google, they'll sunset this project within a few years and these GM EVs will lose support and fall behind on the features Google adds to their own hardware.
Sidenote: I would be more open to this approach if GM created a modular upgrade option for the infotainment system. Today's hardware will not run tomorrow's software the same as tomorrow's hardware.
For me, CarPlay/Android Auto was a must when we got a new EV this summer, as I see it as a backup in case the car's interface gets borked in an update, or abandoned.
I don't currently use it because I find the native interface superior, but I do want the option.
All car software is abaondonware after a period of time. This idea of constant software updates, risky as that is, only came about recently. And no manufacturer is going to update every year of every model forever.
If you aren’t leaving this exact same comment on all the Tesla shilling going on, you’re not genuine about your beliefs and I’ll write you off as a paid shill.
I still don't understand the benefit to an individual customer, and I don't buy that this implementation will be less distracting than Android Auto.
Once the bugs are worked out, Android Auto users will still continue to see user improvements much faster than GM's custom Android build. It's only a matter of time until Google sunsets support for GM's current vehicles running their custom build. At that point, GM will either use that as leverage to get you to buy a new vehicle, and/or cave to user demand and reinstate Android Auto support in newer vehicles.
I worry there isn't any value to the customer, and that this is really about taking back control of the software so they can sell subscriptions.
We live in a world where seat heating was a subscription service in a luxury car after all.
I'm very familiar with this dynamic from work. "We're deprecating v1.0, and looking forward to announcing the release of v2.0 any month now. All past defects will now be marked as 'will not fix', and all future defects will be nonexistent, because we're really smart. If you are lucky enough to find a bug in 2.0, prepare for some gaslighting from an engineer who tells you that YOU are the problem because you have failed to rewrite your entire app around the new, poorly documented API. Oh, docs are a fast follow."
But it's one thing to try that move on the captive customer base that is one's fellow engineers; surprised to see it done quite so boldly on the general public.
Apple CarPlay and Android Auto were such great ideas; they were almost too true from the beginning announcements.
But between slow adoption, weird differences of implementation, and automakers realizing they are missing out on important (tracking/data aggregation) touch points, we are headed back to where we started.
I rent a car 6 times a year so I’m not a heavy renter but car play has been out for a while so I have seen a lot of different implementations over the years. I love it! I dread if I ever get a rental without it. I never have to use the interface of the car. I have the same consistent fully integrated experience everywhere I go.
Rental cars are actually the perfect use case for CarPlay and Android Auto. No faffing about figuring out an unfamiliar interface, just bring your own and take your presets and preferences with you.
My naive hope was just for the car to be a dumb second monitor, where the underlying standard just needs to have enough bandwidth and features like HDMI or Displayport, and then not need major changes for years and years despite the video out device evolving. Basic things like video out, audio out/in, night/day mode.
That is basically what CarPlay is, using proprietary streaming similar to AirPlay (which works wirelessly, not only over a cable). It’s slightly more sophisticated than a dumb audio/video/touch pipe: the phone can indicate different audio modes (music, navigation alert, etc.) and the car can send notifications (low on fuel, use dark mode), but these are optional.
My car is 7 years old and cost like $16,000 new (I bought it 3 years later used) and CarPlay had worked nearly flawlessly. I now even use some cheap generic Chinese "wireless carplay adapter" which I maybe need to replug once a month when it glitches out, still more stable than Bluetooth.
I bought one of these too (ottocast) and yeah it has quirks but man, wireless CarPlay is even better than the wired one. I can just jump in the car and the phone can stay in my pocket.
I wouldn’t bother with any car that doesn’t have CarPlay or Android Auto. Most car companies are just bad at building user interfaces, and my phone is already an excellent infotainment system. Why duplicate the work?
I agree but for two issues with Android Auto/CarPlay that I hope they can fix, but might prove difficult since AA/CarPlay is, AFAIU, just a video feed:
- for EVs, route planning since AA/CarPlay doesn't know anything about the SoC, and battery pre-conditioning since the car doesn't know anything about the navigation
- likewise, no HUD integration with the navigation
This only really matters for longer road trips though.
One thing I've noticed with Android Auto in my Taos is that the turn-by-turn directions are displayed on the main driver's display (I don't have a HUD) when I am navigating in Google Maps, suggesting that there is some protocol for sharing the directions.
It would be nice, though, to have the actual map be shared (the built-in nav has some cool integrations), and for commands to be transmitted back to Android Auto from the car - for example with steering wheel controls, or when low on charge/gas looking for a charging/gas station.
EV route planning on CarPlay already exists, with the option to automatically plan charging stops and charging point usage information (e.g., x available spots etc.). Don’t know if it feeds anything back to help with preconditioning though.
Sadly only a handful of manufacturers make use of this. Seems to be only Porsche Taycan and Ford Mustang Mach-E thus far(0)
As for HUD integration, the next gen CarPlay concept showed that as a possibility, but the two concepts announced yesterday by Porsche and Aston Martin didn’t show that implementation[1].
Car are becoming reliable and from what I can get EV need less maintenance.
How are they gonna recoup that lost money, if people don't need to go to the dealership every now and then to change oil?
Subscription all the way!
Want map/gps? Free version has ad, 7.99/month to remove ads.
And you want traffic prediction? Go for the premium at 9.99$!
Music? Comes with free Spotify. Buy the premium through the car, gm gets a cut.
I'm not smart enough to think of all the possibilities but the way I look at it, I'll stay with my own phone connected on Bluetooth and a 10$ phone holder.
Louis Rossmann did a video on this topic recently. His main point was that GM is removing CarPlay to get more money from customers by demanding a monthly fee for traffic data and other features that are already available on your CarPlay.
I assumed it was to track users and sell that data. Won't most people just endure the poorer experience of using their phone and ignore the half baked GM solution?
