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Comment by nickserv | Hacker News Reader

I'm unfortunately in the market for a new car, and I'm having to look into work vehicles like small cargo vans to avoid all this nonsense.

Touchscreens, radars, special Android apps, automatic climate control, buttons on the steering wheel...

Enough already, I just want a fucking car!

Airbags and antilock brakes save lives. A/C is useful in summer. Radio is nice. The rest is garbage.

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The right set of buttons on the steering wheel are a life saver. Quite literally. How often do you take the hands off the steering wheel to adjust the radio? Be honest. Even if you're not looking at the radio, your attention is focussed on finding and manipulating the controls by touch. The control over the car is diminished because you don't have both hands on the wheel (important for quick reactions, less so for driving straight). The same goes for cruise control that can be controlled entirely with the thumb and hands on the wheel.

Maybe a set of useful buttons should be mandated on the steering wheel?

I admit that in the first couple months it might be more dangerous, but once I get used to the controls, I don't need to think about it and can just go on muscle memory.

Yes it means that one hand is momentarily off the wheel but I drive a stick shift so that's gonna happen anyway.

In any case I'm not completely against steering wheel buttons per se, just that all the cars I've seen have entirely too many of them.

I feel all these gizmos are more distracting than anything else, and take away from focusing on the road. But maybe it's just grumpy old man mode slowly setting in.

My Ford Fiesta feels like they really half-assed the QA on the steering wheel UX. There are some << and >> buttons on the steering wheel, which work fine for FM radio, but I exclusively use Sirius in the car and instead of going to the previous/next channels like you'd expect, << and >> just go straight to channel 184, and you have to use the center dash buttons to adjust the channel.

Is "184" the only channel that has been saved as a preset? Typically those buttons cycle among preset channels.

Oh my god, I've had this car for six years, and you're entirely correct. Thank you so much.

Still awkward UX since the steering wheel buttons have exactly the same icons as the dash buttons yet do different things, but their functionality is described correctly if you read the entire vehicle manual.

Haha you're welcome. Also you should upvote that comment. b^)

>How often do you take the hands off the steering wheel to adjust the radio?

Far less often than taking a hand off to operate the gear lever or handbrake.

I have an old car that came with a crappy radio, so I bought a cheap Pioneer one, that kind that looks like a brick. One big knob for volume, for everything else it has raised buttons that are easy to find by touch and hard to press by accident. I rarely have to take my eyes off the road to use it.

IMHO, all car radios should be like that.

The radars can save lives by detecting an imminent collision and sounding an alarm ("pay attention!") or automatically breaking.

The buttons on the steering wheel are also a safety feature, since it lets you keep your eyes on the road.

Just bought a ‘99 BMW and I couldn’t be happier. All the important stuff (airbags, ABS, etc), comfort (a/c, heated seats, power windows/top), and beautifully simple controls. Nothing else.

Old car EV conversion is ready for your money

I would do it in a heartbeat but for lack of a way to charge it.

I heard some countries are lacking a good enough electrical grid to do that .. sad.

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