[Anvandarnam]

Nice to have this confirmed by actual testing.

Physical buttons are increasingly rare in modern cars. Most manufacturers are switching to touchscreens – which perform far worse in a test carried out by Vi Bilägare. The driver in the worst-performing car needs four times longer to perform simple tasks than in the best-performing car.

The screens in modern cars keep getting bigger. Design teams at most car manufacturers love to ditch physical buttons and switches, although they are far superior safety-wise.

That is the conclusion when Swedish car magazine Vi Bilägare performed a thurough test of the HMI system (Human-Machine Interface) in a total of twelve cars this summer.
../
The results speak for themselves. The worst-performing car needs 1,400 meters to perform the same tasks for which the best-performing car only needs 300 meters.

The easiest car to understand and operate, by a large margin, is the 2005 Volvo V70. The four tasks is handled within ten seconds flat, during which the car is driven 306 meters at 110 km/h.

At the other end of the scale, Chinese electric car MG Marvel R performs far worse. The driver needs 44.6 seconds before all the tasks are completed, during which the car has travelled 1,372 meters – more than four times the distance compared to the old Volvo.

BMW iX and Seat Leon perform better, but both are still too complicated. The driver needs almost a kilometer to perform the tasks. Lots can happen in traffic during that time.

Dacia Sandero and Volvo C40 perform well although they both have touchscreens. However, they are not overloaded with features. Volvo shows that a touchscreen doesn’t need to be complicated.

https://www.vibilagare.se/nyheter/ph...ars-test-finds

Reject the touchscreen takeover - Embrace the physical knob 👌

[mikado463]

Originally Posted by Anvandarnam

Reject the touchscreen takeover - Embrace the physical knob 👌

agreed

[M-technik-3]

Cars will be look like living rooms in a house any day of the week at night, brightly lit room from a screen glowing.

Don't understand the push for more distractions that a driver does not need.

[RM7]

Originally Posted by Anvandarnam

Nice to have this confirmed by actual testing.



https://www.vibilagare.se/nyheter/ph...ars-test-finds

Reject the touchscreen takeover - Embrace the physical knob 👌

Welcome to last week.

[Anvandarnam]

Six years later I was overcome by the need to have a car with actual knobs and buttons. It does have electric seats and windows but nothing else.

Cassette deck is OEM+ with BT on the AM band.

Got my second G99 this week and apparently now they give a continuous notification when the driver is weating sunglasses since it can't scan your eyes...

[JABCAT]

Originally Posted by Anvandarnam

Got my second G99 this week and apparently now they give a continuous notification when the driver is weating sunglasses since it can't scan your eyes...

I was not happy to find out I cannot turn off/uncheck the "fatigue alert" in my M2 like I can in my wife's X3MC. Almost every week I drive 250 mi from Dallas to Austin & back. Sometimes that drive takes 3.5 hr, sometimes 4.5-5 hours. I'm constantly bombarded with the "we think you should take a break" alert.

The irony is that the alert requires me to take my eyes off the road and make a selection on the screen out of 3 choices:

1. Yes, find a rest stop
2. Remind me again later
3. Cancel for this trip

[Davil]

Originally Posted by JABCAT

I was not happy to find out I cannot turn off/uncheck the "fatigue alert" in my M2 like I can in my wife's X3MC. Almost every week I drive 250 mi from Dallas to Austin & back. Sometimes that drive takes 3.5 hr, sometimes 4.5-5 hours. I'm constantly bombarded with the "we think you should take a break" alert.

The irony is that the alert requires me to take my eyes off the road and make a selection on the screen out of 3 choices:

1. Yes, find a rest stop
2. Remind me again later
3. Cancel for this trip

It is insane. I was driving my wife’s Kia and it just constantly flashes crap about everything. So bloody dangerous as you stop looking at the road every time.

The best safety is a manual gearbox, an engine you can hear and zero driver aids other than ABS. You have to pay attention to actually driving and you actually feel that YOU are driving. The modern stuff you lose being present.

[TimmyTurbos]

One of the main reasons I went F8X. It's really the perfect balance of screen vs physical buttons. I don't want to sift through 3 menus to turn on my heated seat.

[afadeev]

Originally Posted by Anvandarnam

Embrace the physical knob 👌

That sounds like a working title for a porn movie...

Originally Posted by RM7

Welcome to last week.

Indeed.
A reasonable mix of two input/output modes works best. The market will find the right balance, just give it time.

Originally Posted by Anvandarnam

Six years later I was overcome by the need to have a car with actual knobs and buttons. It does have electric seats and windows but nothing else.
Cassette deck is OEM+ with BT on the AM band.

Do you actually own a cassette tape?
I still remember what they look like, but don't even know if anyone sells those anymore. My kids wouldn't know what to do with them. Same goes for CDs, VHS tapes, and phone booths.

No, I don't miss any of the above!

YMMV,
a

[JABCAT]

Originally Posted by afadeev

Do you actually own a cassette tape?
I still remember what they look like, but don't even know if anyone sells those anymore. My kids wouldn't know what to do with them. Same goes for CDs, VHS tapes, and phone booths.

No, I don't miss any of the above!

YMMV,
a

My son wants my CD collection when I die & I specifically installed a head unit with CD in my Z06

[vt100]

Hehe... I'm seriously thinking of getting a high-end vinyl player. Have been dreaming of one since my youth

[zx10guy]

Apparently Mazda didn't read the memo when they engineered the third gen 2026 CX-5.

With the off topic, I'm always a proponent of physical media. Don't have to worry about compression ruining the quality of the material. Don't have to worry about the content streamer quietly removing content you paid for. I still have CD/Bluray-4K players. If need be, I can hook up a VHS or tape deck player. Still have a very good quality Onkyo TA-2600 3 head cassette player/recorder. I'm actually waiting on Magnetar to have stock again with their UDP800 MKII 4k player to replace my Oppo Digital UDP 203 4k player. And if you look at street prices for the UDP 203, you'll find prices that are at least double what they were new showing that there is demand for quality physical 4k players.

On the vinyl front, I have a VPI HW19 Jr. with a bunch of upgrades connected to a Vincent Audio tube phono preamp.

[tom @ eas]

Didn't need a study to determine this. Long live buttons.

[gonzo]

Originally Posted by zx10guy

Apparently Mazda didn't read the memo when they engineered the third gen 2026 CX-5.

With the off topic, I'm always a proponent of physical media. Don't have to worry about compression ruining the quality of the material. Don't have to worry about the content streamer quietly removing content you paid for. I still have CD/Bluray-4K players. If need be, I can hook up a VHS or tape deck player. Still have a very good quality Onkyo TA-2600 3 head cassette player/recorder. I'm actually waiting on Magnetar to have stock again with their UDP800 MKII 4k player to replace my Oppo Digital UDP 203 4k player. And if you look at street prices for the UDP 203, you'll find prices that are at least double what they were new showing that there is demand for quality physical 4k players.

On the vinyl front, I have a VPI HW19 Jr. with a bunch of upgrades connected to a Vincent Audio tube phono preamp.

On the audio topic...

[RM7]

I'm good with a decent combination. My 2016 BMW was decent, it had the mouse-rotating knob that was pretty good and natural for your hand and could also do touch. Where screens are good is for things where you want multiple functions/reconfiguring, so like gauge clusters, which now we are finally getting on most vehicles. My 2018 Camaro is better than that BMW though, it's pretty damn perfect in this regard. All HVAC is buttons. You get 3 volume and changing song controls, on the wheel, on the display face (actual button) and on the touchscreen, so it's nice to be able to choose. Similar to how the BMW had a "partial display cluster" the Camaro does it a lot better, with two real gauges and some trick lighting with a big screen in the middle, so it allows for reconfig while keeping the two gauges constant, then there's the HUD for actual hard driving. Everything I've had since has moved further towards screens for everything and in turn, more frustrating with controls. I've not bought any of the real stupid ones, but the latest Chevrolet ZR2 is annoying with the headlight (as in friggin high beams) and camera controls accessed with annoying hard-to-hit touchscreen buttons.

I've said it before, but this is all ergonomics 101. You design controls with shapes and feedback so drivers can adjust them without causing excessive distraction. All of this touchscreen based stuff is way too distracting to make adjustments to things needed, like lights, HVAC, safety features, etc.

[ShocknAwe]

Study shows we knew this without the study.

No one wants the screens. It's a major piece of the enshittification master plan.

[gblansten]

The only thing I mess with in my Tesla is Spotify and TuneIn. Occasionally change the temp which is on the bottom left of the screen near me. I like a simpler setup. But I also don't begrudge any of the rest of you on having a preference for buttons.

[allinon72]

The selling point was never ease of use or ergonomics. It allows manufacturers to more easily make a car look more "high tech" while at the same time saving a boatload in manufacturing. Far easier to digitize something on a screen that's already going to be present, and the screen itself is far cheaper than switchgear.

Software is cheaper than hardware. That's it.

[nick3753]