Hacker News Reader

Comment by dmitriid | Hacker News Reader

If you need a manual to discover what is arguably the most commonly used function in the car, it’s a design failure.

Thanks to comments on HN and elsewhere I finally discovered the wheel. It’s horrible to say the least:

- literally nothing else in the entire car is operated via such a wheel.

- literally nothing else in the car feels like the wheel (what happens when the wheel “clicks” twice? Is it one operation (like everywhere else) or two?

- For some reason it pops up a modal window on the touch screen that shows the current song, takes a while to show the next song, and the moment it shows the next song it disappears. Why can’t it behave like next/previous buttons on the touch screen?

There’s no bottom to the abyss that is Renault design.

View on HN

Agreed, the UI is far from perfect. I would like to have buttons for lots of stuff or at least shortcuts in the dashboard.

The stick including the wheel is most likely a stock version as it is used in nearly all Renault cars for the last 10 years. I have one in my 10 year old Megane and nearly the same in the 2 year old Scenic.

The popup might be there to be able to switch Radio Stations/Titles etc. when you have something else in full screen mode (like navigation).

I would like to know what is the OS of this thing. Android? Tizen? I have this "Arkamys 3D Sound Demo" in my Bose-Scenic. But it is only a Demo. How to activate this permanently?

I just have to disagree. A car company can and should expect the users to read the manual. If you only use what's visible in the driver's seat, you'll never find the sump plug, service plan, tyre spec, engine bay...

The alternative is worse ergonomics for people who do read it to give better discoverability to those who won't.

No, a car company should expect users to read the manual for rarely used and undisciverable things. Controlling the radio is not the same as looking for the service plan. Controlling the A/C is definitely not the same as changing tyres twice a year.

Discoverability is an important part of UX, and if you can’t solve that for the most common tasks, what good is your design?

I’ve driven over forty car models over the past 8 years (I don’t own a car, so I’m always driving tentals, friends’ cars, car shares, carpools etc.). Renault is the only one that continuously confuses me with their choices (after two weeks and over 1000 km). It takes a special, oblivious kind of designer to achieve that.

Try Peugeot as well:)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com