Cars will need fewer screens and more buttons to earn a 5-star safety rating in Europe | Euro NCAP will introduce new testing rules in 2026 requiring physical controls for the highest safety score
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Driving and texting is dangerous. Put down that phone and stare at this ipad in your dash! Further the ipad is slow, designed by imbeciles, is glitchy, buggy, and not intuitive and doesn't follow modern design standards.
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Exactly!
This pretty much summarises it.
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thank god. I hope this trend migrates to other countries. The amount of effort/distraction for touch screens combined with the additional cost of having to replace full on infotainment systems is annoying.
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I think I agree. I would be fine with an infotainment system that:
- doesn't cripple the car when broken
- isn't integrated with non-screen controls like climate
- still has functional buttons on the steering wheel
My malibu meets 2 and 3, but the fact that if the infotainment system breaks it cripples the entire car, puts me on edge. This would be mitigated if actual functionality was outside of it, and that the touch screen was just a control layer.
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I consider temperature and fan controls to be safety critical for demisting windows etc for example.
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now with #ADS, please tap the x to continue changing your GPS.
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Not far enough indeed.
I dont need all my entertainment as physical controls but I do at least want volume - and that is totally justifiable as a safety consideration too. Sometimes you need to mute it quickly if you think you heard something of concern on the road - or if you are like me, just to concentrate on driving when things get tricky..
There are so many other items you can apply similar safety arguments for:
Blowers and demisters - you shouldn't be messing around in a touchscreen when you see your windows starting to fog
Cabin temperature - Uncomfortable driver = distracted driver
In my opinion, the place to draw the line should be this:
If the driver always has the luxury of choosing when to engage with the feature, then it can be fully touchscreen. (example - entertainment except volume, fuel economy settings, electric seat position)
If the need to interact with the feature is triggered by external conditions and will happen in motion, it MUST be physical. (Example: wipers, heating, blowers, all headlight and fog light controls, enable or diasable lane assist, cruise control)
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I hope the standard makes it clear that touch buttons are about as bad as a touch screen is
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If they could ban the "confirm you know the rules of the fucking road" dialogue box that would be great.
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What, keeping a rag on hand to wipe away the fog on the windshield every 3 minutes isn't safe enough?
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Screen consoles in 4000lb bullets were the dumbest engineering idea ever. It’s probably a contributing factor as to why accident rates are up.
Up until 2018 I could manipulate my entire console without shifting my eyes from the road. Doing this by touch alone only works with physical buttons and knobs.
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How about just banning touchscreen use while driving altogether?
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I can't imagine why anyone would think it's a good idea
Suposedly it's to cut costs but I find it very hard to believe a few buttons add much cost at all. Much less at the expense of customer satisfaction. Tripping over a dollar to pick up a dime, in my opinion.
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The button might be 1c, but you gotta wire it, install it, warranty it etc etc. It's not as inconsequential as you might think. And there's a lot of them.
A screen is the screen and the wiring to the computer.
It's a couple skus to maintain instead of dozens. It's 1 warranty item instead of dozens.
It might not be a good idea, but it absolutely will save a noticeable amount of money per vehicle.
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it absolutely will save a noticeable amount of money per vehicle.
I don't believe that.
Monroe has talked about how they removed some bolts that weren't absolutely necessary from the vehicle, saving them hundreds of thousands of dollars. In that case, it's fine. In this case I think it's the same situation except they don't care about driver safety. If the driver is fucking with touchscreens and crashes, that's gonna be on the driver.
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You're contradicting yourself LOL
I don’t believe that.
Monroe has talked about how they removed some bolts that weren’t absolutely necessary from the vehicle, saving them hundreds of thousands of dollars. In that case, it’s fine.
Its okay if you don't like it, but come on dude, a screen is going to be cheaper by 10s or maybe a hundred dollars a car. Were talking 10s of millions saved with any company doing this at scale.
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Replace the steering wheel with a Steam Deck.
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You're contradicting yourself LOL
No I'm not ROFLCOPTER
a screen is going to be cheaper by 10s or maybe a hundred dollars a car
10s, yes. Hundreds, no.
Were talking 10s of millions or more saved with any company doing this at scale
Money saved to the company, not the end user. The end user just receives a severely degraded and unsafe experience.
I mean shit, let's just remove all the seats, that'll save THOUSANDS per car, right!?
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Okay, so you admit, using a screen saves money.
Thank you, it was a pleasure watching you come to the realization.
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Well, presumably this group is more about models of cars and less about individual driver behavior.
