Physical buttons outperform touchscreens in new cars

[Gweeds]

I think most of us will have guessed this anyway, but it's quite a difference....

https://www.vibilagare.se/nyheter/physical-buttons...

[MikeGTi]

While it does seem obvious, the difference between best and worst is far more than I was expecting.

[TGCOTF-dewey]

Ergonomists have known this fact for years. Shows you how little real ergomics goes into csr design.

The US navy are in the process of removing touchscreens ftom the bridges of their surface fleet as they offer zero haptic feedback, and implicated in several big incidents.

[thiscocks]

And the V70 dash looks about 50 times better than all the modern ones with screens tacked on

[Nickbrapp]

Doesn’t matter, touchscreens are cheaper

[Gweeds]

Nickbrapp said:

Doesn’t matter, touchscreens are cheaper

We know that. Not really the point though.

[swisstoni]

It wasn’t that long ago that car makers couldn’t stop telling you about how much effort they made into optimising ergonomics. It was a buzzword.

Nowadays, not so much.

Touchscreens are simpler, and people currently equate screens (size and count) to degree of spec.

[JmatthewB]

I wonder how well the touchscreens will perform in 10 years time. The joy of having an on/off button for the radio and an auto button for the air con.

[Krikkit]

JmatthewB said:

I wonder how well the touchscreens will perform in 10 years time. The joy of having an on/off button for the radio and an auto button for the air con.

Exactly the same as they do now, why wouldn't they?

Not that I'm in favour of screens for vital functions - imho there should be a rule dictating that the basic HVAC controls (temperature(s), fan speed/auto) and stereo on/off should be a physical button.

[Hill92]

TGCOTF-dewey said:

Ergonomists have known this fact for years. Shows you how little real ergomics goes into csr design.

The US navy are in the process of removing touchscreens ftom the bridges of their surface fleet as they offer zero haptic feedback, and implicated in several big incidents.

Apples and oranges. The US Navy were using touchscreens for helm which is not something any car does. They're reverting back to a mechanical helm and throttle but touchscreen functions will remain in other uses (e.g. navigation).

[Earthdweller]

The length of time the eyes are off the road to complete simple tasks is significant

Bearing in mind that merely touching a mobile phone in a car will get you six points it would be very interesting to see how the use of a touchscreen built into a car compares with the use of basic functions on a mobile

If someone’s distracted for several hundred metres adjusting the temperature how does that compare with answering a phone call ?

Perhaps touchscreens are as distracting or more so than mobile phones ?

[Krikkit]

Hill92 said:

TGCOTF-dewey said:

Ergonomists have known this fact for years. Shows you how little real ergomics goes into csr design.

The US navy are in the process of removing touchscreens ftom the bridges of their surface fleet as they offer zero haptic feedback, and implicated in several big incidents.

Apples and oranges. The US Navy were using touchscreens for helm which is not something any car does. They're reverting back to a mechanical helm and throttle but touchscreen functions will remain in other uses (e.g. navigation).

Not really, it's a perfect case of the best controls being ones which have inherent haptic feedback. The helm controls of a ship aren't really comparable to the steering/throttle of a car as it's a much slower process for every input.

[JmatthewB]

Krikkit said:

JmatthewB said:

I wonder how well the touchscreens will perform in 10 years time. The joy of having an on/off button for the radio and an auto button for the air con.

Exactly the same as they do now, why wouldn't they?
.

I’m wondering just because my old phones become more sluggish over time. Is this just because of memory issues and IoS software updates or because of physical degradation?

[Cliftonite]

In principle, is the proliferation of touch screens a repeat of the Ford Pinto scandal?

(I.e. it may well be cheaper for a manufacturer to risk paying potential claims for deaths and destruction than to make a safe(r) car):

https://www.spokesman.com/blogs/autos/2008/oct/17/...

[MesoForm]

Gweeds said:

I think most of us will have guessed this anyway, but it's quite a difference....

https://www.vibilagare.se/nyheter/physical-buttons...

I'm very much in favour of physical buttons and chose my current car (Disco Sport) as it had more buttons than the other one I was looking at (XC60) but looking at what they did in the test:
Activate the heated seat, increase temperature by two degrees, and start the defroster.
Power on the radio and adjust the station to a specific channel (Sweden’s Program 1).
Reset the trip computer.
Lower the instrument lighting to the lowest level and turn off the center display.

I don't think I've ever done the last two when moving? Setting satnav to home and changing audio source from Radio to Bluetooth would seem much more relevant tests.

[sxmwht]

JmatthewB said:

I’m wondering just because my old phones become more sluggish over time. Is this just because of memory issues and IoS software updates or because of physical degradation?

It's because the software starts becoming too much for the hardware. If you were to totally reset an old iPhone to the software it shipped with, it'd be as it was out of the box. Note that it might still feel slow, because new devices that you've used in the meantime are much faster.

[ingenieur]

Love a good button. Not counting twice for 'rocker' switches for windows etc... there's over a 100 in my old Mercedes. It's great. It has a touch screen as well...

[BS62]

I frequently turn off centre displays at night, when moving, as even on minimum brightness they can still cause glare on really dark roads (west country M5/M4 for example, or country lanes in general). Having that function buried deep in submenus is a pain.

[ucb]

I'm dreading changing my F11.
It has buttons for ventilation, heated seats etc and the iDrive controls anything else which seems to work well.
I test drove a V90 before purchasing and I could not get on with the touchscreen. It was quite apparent that it would take ages to learn where eveything is in the submenus etc and the touchscreen was covered in fingermarks which irritates me endlessly

[Krikkit]

JmatthewB said:

I’m wondering just because my old phones become more sluggish over time. Is this just because of memory issues and IoS software updates or because of physical degradation?

Yes, in Apple's case (and possibly others) they deliberately limit the processing power on old phones for "battery life extension". aka "We want you to buy a new phone so we slow the old one down"

They also add new and more complex features etc to the software over time which are optimised for more power, all the manufacturers are guilty of this.

In the case of a car touch-screen, if you don't update the software it'll perform exactly the same in 10 years as it does now.