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Comment by ct0 | Hacker News Reader

You've never been to death valley without air conditioning Or Russia without heat. I think the infotainment system in this case has a broken climate control function. There are workarounds, but why if you don't have your phone?

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This is a great point. I would claim that it would be a bad choice to initiate the update (it's a manual process, requiring intent) when you're in these conditions. But, a less tech savvy person may not understand that updates can be risky, and give it a shot at a remote charging station.

I have been talking recently to someone whose job involves sometimes driving to other continents, and they mentioned that cars more recent than ~2003 were out of the question because outside of the EU you cannot expect random mechanics to have the computers required to interface with the car's computers - required for repairs.

If that's the only problem, then that would be fixed simply by taking "computers required to interface with the car's computers" i.e. a <$200 OBD-II device with you in the car, not choosing a car with 20+ years of wear and tear.

Also, since many of these places have a lot of used cars that once were in the EU or other places with legally required computers, this is changing as now most of the mechanics even in relatively poor remote places have to have these devices as now many of their local customers don't have "computerless" cars any more, and the existing pre-2003 cars won't last forever even there.

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