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I wonder if there will be a resurgence of "dumb" cars once people get tired of and become more aware of the disadvantages of these overly-complex systems, like has happened with phones; IMHO one of the very few things a touchscreen is useful for in a car is a GPS, because that's a relatively complex system which can't really be simplified to physical controls. Everything else should really be knobs and switches. How much of a market would there be for a "dumb EV", basically the exact opposite of a Tesla but still electric, with only the bare minimum of electronics and software? Imagine a car whose interior looks like one from the late 70s/early 80s, with all analogue controls and indicators, except that it's actually an EV.

The other big disadvantage is the failure mode: if the screen fails, a whole set of functionality becomes inaccessible, whereas a single switch failure won't affect any others.

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> The other big disadvantage is the failure mode: if the screen fails, a whole set of functionality becomes inaccessible

Yep, the touch screen in my car cracked recently and the AC got stuck on a very low setting and was constantly blowing out cold air - there was no way to adjust it without using the screen.

It is not only the single point of failure that is annoying but the fact that to control the AC you need to use the touch screen in AC mode which mean switching from GPS mode or radio mode etc. Very distracting when driving.

Car designers: Please give us more knobs!

To be entirely fair I had the exact same problem with a "knob" interface. The variable resistor in the AC knob broke down putting the AC in the "just blow air as hard as you can, always" mode.

With a fully digital solution it should even be easier to provide workarounds for situations like that (e.g. remote screen on your phone). I'm not a big fan of touchscreens in cars though, but this particular argument doesn't feel strong to me.

Even older cars have cables (as in mechanical linkages) connected to those knobs.

I can replace a resistor pack for $20 with a single Phillips screwdriver. I can even (and have) replaced a transistor when I couldn’t find the part in stock (I had a box of large transistors from an old project). With a screen I am at the mercy of the dealership for what seems to amount to a ‘coolness factor’. Hard pass.

If everything is operated through the touch screen you lose a lot when the screen fails. With knobs only the function of the knob fails.

I can see this happening in a lot of these cars. Tesla does have a phone app that does most of the crucial things, assuming your car has data. You can adjust the climate controls, close the top, lock or unlock, start the car. Adjust the seat heaters.

The auto dealer's profit model is to keep the lights on with new car sales and make the real money through their service department.

Easily broken things equal more money for the service department.

I hate all the new stuff on cars because it's just more stuff that can break.

Source: I was a mechanic for a few years between stints at university.

I think it suits contemporary culture that cars with any kind of luxury pretense would catastrophically break in a small number of years.

Elon doesn’t want gross poors driving our beloved Tesla 3s in five or ten years!

The whole idea of the Tesla 3 is that poor(we) people will drive them in 5 to 10 years.

But you buy them new, not via the second hand market when Musk earns nothing.

So much for environment friendly.

> Imagine a car whose interior looks like one from the late 70s/early 80s, with all analogue controls and indicators, except that it's actually an EV.

Something like this?

https://www.theverge.com/transportation/2017/7/27/16052118/b...

Yes, like that, but in the form of a car instead of a truck/SUV.

That looks absolutely amazing. But I've always been an old style military Jeep looks fan.

being multi-modal i occasionally rent cars, so i've seen a variety of infotainment implementations.

i'd love simplifying cars on two fronts: (1) the use of standard knobs and buttons for radio and air conditioning on the dash (in addition to a touchscreen for maps), and (2) removal of takeover features like lane assist and collision avoidance. i don't believe these "safety features" actually promote safety. instead, they allow people to be even more distracted and low skilled.

in one of the cars i rented recently, the collision detection system activated, not once but twice, while i was trying to avoid a collision. the autmatic braking almost caused an accident by disregarding my direct control. afterwards, i looked for a way to disable automatic collision avoidance but couldn't find it.

As a counter-point, the collision avoidance in my car has saved me from hitting a deer twice in the past 18 months. The brakes activated as my foot was moving towards that pedal. I’ve never had a false alarm activation.

This is with a 2018 Audi. YMMV.

Same in my 2017 Audi - prevented a sure collision with a deer, and like you my foot was still moving towards the brake when the car stopped. Also, no false alarms in 35,000 miles.

I have a 2015 Jeep Cherokee (not a recommendation, it's a terrible car in too many respects) and while it does have rare false alarms with Forward Collision Warning (not AEB) almost exclusively when driving on a single lane highway and approaching a vehicle that is part-way through turning off. FWIW I always leave the FCW set to its most sensitive setting.

I've never had an AEB false alarm in ~50,000 km.

I would never, ever own a car without it now.

I wonder how long it will be until the first "Boeing 737 Max MCAS" car model presents itself.

I'm not the only person I know who would like a newer vehicle, and could afford one, but has opted for something made in the mid 90's. I can maintain it myself, it doesn't have all the distracting BS, and comes with a full size spare. The car you describe is the only new car I could be convinced to buy. Until then, I'll be keeping the 90's alive.

> I'm not the only person I know who would like a newer vehicle, and could afford one, but has opted for something made in the mid 90's.

Just so you know, the safety improvements since the mid 90's have been quite substantial.

There was a discussion recently (on HN, I believe) where a video was linked showing a collision between a mid 90's Accord and a modern equivalent.

The results were quite astonishing, to me at least.

It'd be nice if you could get the safety improvements without the UI changes, but as in software, that's not really in the interest of the manufacturer.

Cars from the mid to later 2000's have button and only had crappy touch screens for the inbuilt gps which is horrible. It was when the Tesla model S came out every manufacturer when screen crazy!

I've gone as high as mid-2000s and had no trouble doing the maintenance myself.

>> and comes with a full size spare

I am curious, how often do you need a spare tire, full size or otherwise?

Have you never gotten a flat tire? With a full size spare, it takes ten minutes to change, and you're on your way like nothing happened.

With a doughnut or run-flats, you have to limp to a tire shop to repair the tire or get a new one, and if you don't have a spare at all, it's a serious inconvenience at best, and a crisis at worst.

>>Have you never gotten a flat tire?

That's the thing: I do get a punctured tire... sometimes. Maybe every 2-3 years. Not critical, just losing pressure. Not urgent. Last time, local shop fixed it for $28. They gave me a little freezer bag with the nail that they pulled out of the tire.

Now, did I ever have a flat tire that needs a replacement like right now, with the spare tire? Well, I don't remember having that. In several decades of driving.

For the record, I do go to service to get regular maintenance, so every like 3-4 years or so I change tires. I guess that helps.

I'm completely happy hauling around a full size spare for a once in a decade blowout. Having that could easily save me 8 hours of frustration. Possibly more depending on where I am and what time it is.

I'm not carrying it for if I get a slow leak on my work commute, I'm carrying it for when I'm taking forest roads in durango, or driving across nebraska at 2am. I carry a blanket and chains in winter for the same reasons.

>I wonder if there will be a resurgence of "dumb" cars once people get tired of and become more aware of the disadvantages of these overly-complex systems

yes this is already happening. at least among car enthusiasts and "hipsters" buying vintage cars or stick shift/cars without all the technology

What you just described is the car i'd ideally like to own. I don't know much about teslas but aren't the motors and.much of the internals themselves computer driven? Without such a display is it possible to operate them? How much of the computer systems are tied into operation of the vehicle itself?

Sorry if i'm not understanding correctly, i don't know much about them other than what i've read, but from what i understand, the electric motors themselves are a smart system the way they're currently used in electric vehicles. Is it possible to make a completely dumb electric car?

The drivetrain the body and the infotainment are controlled by separate somewhat independent units if you lose the infotainment even if it's used to set the features on or off they should work, i haven't tested a tesla but most other cars run fine without it in some cases you just lose HVAC.

Ok. I honestly had no idea.

In the Tesla Model 3 you can manually reboot the entire infotainment system while driving with no ill effects. You lose all visuals, ability to change settings like the a/c, and even audio like the clicking of the turn signal. You do not lose any driving, safety, or even autopilot functionality. I'm sure there are many regulations around this too.

It's certainly possible, EVs have been around for about as long as batteries and motors have --- over a century:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit_Electric

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henney_Kilowatt

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golf_cart

Computerised motor controllers are used because they can be more efficient, but regular electronic controls or even just mechanical ones are still common in things like golf carts and other "non-road-legal" EVs.

> a resurgence of "dumb" cars [...], like has happened with phones

When did that happen?

On the internet forums for enthusiasts, I bet. In real life, I agree, I haven’t noticed even a single blip of a trend for that phenomenon.

That part also got my attention. On which alternative universe do these guys live in? We have even come to the point of having no buttons on the front part of a phone (e.g. OnePlus 7 Pro), let alone going back to more buttons. I am also pro physical buttons in cars, but that argument simply doesn't hold.

a lot of high end cars are allowing you to skip the huge screens in lieu of analog gauges.

its like the car industry forgot what made the iPhone great... a touch screen device that didn't suck. Before that, everything was a laggy bloated unpredictable mess that sometimes registered a fingerprint

But maybe there will be refinement and maybe more appropriate use of controls?

Touchscreens are great for selecting from a list (ok when driving), or onscreen keyboard (typing in a nav search, not when driving)

on the other hand there are inappropriate uses - sliders suck, small targets suck, etc

I would also mention that most aftermarket audio systems suck (think 1-high DIN). They have no touchscreens, no knobs, stupid lighting and lots of too-tiny buttons.

knobs are actually great. there should be appropriate knobs. They are great for continuously adjustable controls like volume or display brightness. Warning - they suck for selecting from a long list or typing an address letter by letter.

It would be more expensive to make and I doubt many people are willing to pay extra to have less functionality that's not upgrade'able and more expensive to maintain.

Knobs and switches are really (relatively) expensive, not even talking about all custom parts required to put them in nicely and time required to assemble them. I was very surprised about that when I got into electronics. You can basically get a SoC cheaper than a single decent on-off switch.

BMW i3 is, with nearing 5 years experience, pretty good at balancing dumb with tech.

Some aggravations exist: no wifi-update to software, really distracting forced overlay of the main screen with a multisecond advertisement to "keep your eyes off this screen" sort of message, and same behavior when shifting regenerative modes.

Built in nav and knob control is wonderful compared to touch screens.

> really distracting forced overlay of the main screen with a multisecond advertisement to "keep your eyes off this screen" sort of message

I was all prepared to buy a new head unit for my car until I noticed in a review video that it had one of these annoying overlays.

"Let's cover our ass and lower everyone's safety by forcing the driver to pay attention to, and physically press, on a stupid message every time they start the car". Bloody ridiculous.

I've considered buying an Audi for the sole reason that the screen retracts onto the dashboard when you're driving.

Not all of them do that. My 2017 A4 mmi system is fixed to the dash and does not move. No touch controls in the car though. The 2020 model is unfortunately getting touch controls for some things.

Why would you want to buy a car that has a centre console screen so embarrassingly bad that the auto manufacturer feels the need to make hiding it a feature? If they tried harder, they could make the screen so nice that the idea of hiding it would be absurd.

* They could integrate it with the vehicle's aesthetics better so that it looked fundamentally attractive.

* They could use a better backlight, better ambient light sensors and darker graphics so that it wasn't distracting at night.

* They could improve the passive screen state experience so that it was never ugly or distracting.

* They could use separate screens vigilantly so that touch interfaces are near to hand and notifications (e.g. volume changes, navigation, incoming calls, etc) are exclusively shown on a screen near the driver's forward vision.

* And most importantly, they should have physical controls for all common actions. You shouldn't ever have to touch the screen while driving. (Looking at you, Telsa.)

Instead, they attach actuators and mechanisms that are guaranteed to break, probably in the closed position, and you won't be able to use most of the car's functionality until you pay for an expensive repair. Embarrassing.

All Audi's I've seen, except for e-Tron have physical controls and don't require the screen. And being able to hide it seems like a perfectly fine option for the times when you don't need it. When you actually can adjust AC, radio, etc. with real knobs, and aren't using the map, why do you need it? Might as well be abler to hide it.

Not only that, but when you also have the Audi virtual cockpit, you still have an always-on display, which covers many of the functions available from the center screen. I like being able to retract the screen on demand, particularly on longer trips.

Even with a classic one, you get basic navigation instructions, infotainment data etc. on the center console.

Might as well? Be serious, it's a lazy hack.

Seriously? Giving user an option is a bad thing now?

Granted, on mine it is not motorized, but still, when I was driving at night on I-80 through Nevada, where as long as you do not manage to go off road navigation system just tells you "keep going straight for the next 600 miles" I liked turning the screen off altogether.

Audi has done a relatively good job of fighting the touch screen obsession. The 2018 Q5 I rented last year had no touch screen at all; it had a display, and it ran Android Auto, but you interacted through a jog wheel located in the centre console. After a few hours, using the screen was just muscle memory.

Additionally the screen itself is placed above the dash so it doesn't require looking down away from the road.

Because I don't want a screen. But if I want a newer car, they all have them, so a screen that hides most of the time is the best best thing.

Be careful, this may have changed. I bought a 2018 A3 specifically for this reason. I loved that the display could retract away on longer trips when not needed. However, there was a small change in production mid-year where the screen could no longer retract into the dash on demand. As soon as you turn on the car, the screen rises up and stays up until the car turns off. It was billed as a safety issue to be able to switch to the backup camera faster.

I ended up getting a slightly older version that had more test-drive miles on it.

I would be willing to pay a premium for a car with no integrated circuits.

Same, it's a lot cheaper to repair and probably safer overall since people can't drive by and take over it through the bluetooth stack.

Do you mean a brand new car?

There are older cars available that are in better condition than when they were new - but they won't meet today's safety and economy standards.

New cars can be physically safer but are vulnerable to an increasing number of other "virtual" things that wouldn't even be a concern for something much older --- like a remote attacker hacking into and taking control over the Internet, EMP, etc.

There are almost 100 traffic fatalities a day in the US. The number of crashes caused by hacking or EMP is approximately 0. Until such time as these theoretical attacks become a real issue, I'll take my modern crash safety improvements.

None? I doubt you'd be able to meet modern fuel economy requirements without an ECU.

I sort of share that sentiment, but in the extreme version that would mean no anti-lock brakes and no airbags, wouldn't it?

New cars in the USA (and many other countries) are required to have safety features like antilock brakes, electronic stability control, tire pressure monitoring, and backup cameras. Autonomous emergency braking looks like it will be next.

It seems like it would be exceedingly difficult (and/or expensive) to build a legal mass-produced car which has all of these safety features, using no ICs.

Early ABS implementations were mechanical. Ball bearings were involved, can't remember what else, but it was 50-50 what would be the winning the market.

Saloons of yesteryear were possible to park without backup cameras, driving instructors taught you how to look behind through the back window and you could see out the back then if the kids ducked down. It was easy for them to do so as they had no safety belts.

I think no ICs is a bit silly. However, I would like a car that was simplified in the extreme. This does not mean a 1990's or a 1970's car but something more ambitious. The simplifications I want to see are things like parts that can be swapped to left/right or front/rear. So one seat design, one bumper design, one indicator light design, one side mirror design and so on. Also I would want a carbon fibre shell that has no crumple zones, instead the seats slide forward/back to absorb the energy.

The thing would have to be fully EV with no frunk/boot, just have 3-4 foot of legroom in the back and more like a VW van of old with a cab forward design that is entered like a cockpit, so just one side door each side to the central area.

> It was easy for them to do so as they had no safety belts

It was also easier before increased crash safety requirements caused the C pillars to grow massively in size, robbing us of rear window size

I don't think you actually want that though--that would require a return to points for ignition and either carburetor or mechanical fuel injection.

Also likely a generator instead of an alternator, most alternators use ICs for regulation. Having dealt with these systems, I actively convert older vehicles to alternator & electronic ignition to improve the reliability. No ICs would mean the need for a tuneup multiple times per year, vs. modern cars that only require oil changes for regular maintenance.

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