Firmware 7.0 - For Classic Model S

[tinm]

I think the dropping of the "ownership" email is telling.

The official channels for customers to contact Tesla have been reduced to 1) sales and 2) service. Neither is appropriate for concerns about 7.0.

The concept of a team responsible for "ownership experience" seems to have been eliminated. The sales channel is useless for existing customers. The beleagured, way too busy service channel is the last place an existing owner wants to reach out to for issues that are essentially non-important to SERVICE people. Complaining about a sucky UI means nothing to SERVICE people. Their job is to FIX stuff that's broken. Like MASH doctors, they have to triage the incoming requests, because there are so many far more needy "patients" than those with gripes and disappointments but no "injuries."

What is now missing is a channel for existing customers to communicate with the company about ownership issues, disappointments, changes they have no say in. Tesla's message seems to be, we are too big now to care about existing customers. We have too many new ones to deal with, and old-timers need to keep quiet.

Once again, Tesla gets an F when it comes to communications.

 

[yobigd20]

My error... The correct email address is: [email protected]
[email protected]

Are you sure that address is still valid? I remember reading somewhere that it wasn't, and all should use ServiceHelpNA

SORRY- simultaneous post and I can't find how to delete it

Tesla got rid of ownership@ a while ago. I guess they don't care to listen to existing customers anymore.

 

[Cyclone]

I think the dropping of the "ownership" email is telling.

The official channels for customers to contact Tesla have been reduced to 1) sales and 2) service. Neither is appropriate for concerns about 7.0.

The concept of a team responsible for "ownership experience" seems to have been eliminated. The sales channel is useless for existing customers. The beleagured, way too busy service channel is the last place an existing owner wants to reach out to for issues that are essentially non-important to SERVICE people. Complaining about a sucky UI means nothing to SERVICE people. Their job is to FIX stuff that's broken. Like MASH doctors, they have to triage the incoming requests, because there are so many far more needy "patients" than those with gripes and disappointments but no "injuries."

What is now missing is a channel for existing customers to communicate with the company about ownership issues, disappointments, changes they have no say in. Tesla's message seems to be, we are too big now to care about existing customers. We have too many new ones to deal with, and old-timers need to keep quiet.

Once again, Tesla gets an F when it comes to communications.

Sadly, I have to agree with you. I hope it doesn't turn out that one day Tesla is a case-study of how a company could be so innovative and on track to being a front-runner, only to disregard its existing clients and have a competitor leap-frog them.

As many of us have said before, Tesla is doing great right now and have sales hand over fist, but some of that is because they don't have a real competitor in this space at the moment. If a competitor comes along that continues the "old Tesla" attitude to its customers while providing a worthwhile competing product, it will hurt "new Tesla" very much. Which is sad b/c I want to see Tesla succeed and not "in spite" of treating existing customers like second-class citizens.

Ok, time to get off my soap box.

 

[tomas]

I think the dropping of the "ownership" email is telling.

The official channels for customers to contact Tesla have been reduced to 1) sales and 2) service. Neither is appropriate for concerns about 7.0.

The concept of a team responsible for "ownership experience" seems to have been eliminated. The sales channel is useless for existing customers. The beleagured, way too busy service channel is the last place an existing owner wants to reach out to for issues that are essentially non-important to SERVICE people. Complaining about a sucky UI means nothing to SERVICE people. Their job is to FIX stuff that's broken. Like MASH doctors, they have to triage the incoming requests, because there are so many far more needy "patients" than those with gripes and disappointments but no "injuries."

What is now missing is a channel for existing customers to communicate with the company about ownership issues, disappointments, changes they have no say in. Tesla's message seems to be, we are too big now to care about existing customers. We have too many new ones to deal with, and old-timers need to keep quiet.

Once again, Tesla gets an F when it comes to communications.

Wow, such negativity! Your fundamental assumption may be wrong! AFAIK Tesla does log and register issues/complaints that are emailed to @service or @sales. Now, I know some people are insulted that they don't get a form letter back saying "we read your...". Or a personalized credit in the release notes. Or a thank you tweet from Musk. Thing is, when you have 100k+ cars on the road, you have to monitor trends, not single data points. Knowing that Tesla peruses this forum (as well as their own) and that many have written their concerns, I suspect they have received the message regarding v7 shortcomings that need to be addressed in future releases. That doesn't mean everybody's pet peeve will be addressed, but I suspect near future release will alleviate vast majority. If I'm wrong, you can then come back and say "I told you so, they don't listen".

 

[wk057]

Do either of you know whether your car ha the first gen instrument cluster of the second? I don't know when it changed, but the older one was generally regarded as more responsive, but had lower resolution. Perhaps wk's wife's P85 had the newer one and it's been optimized enough to perform as well as the older one always did? If mknox has the older one, perhaps it didn't really see much (if any) of an improvement with v7 and that could account for the different experiences?

My car has the older style. I believe you can tell by the thickness of the bezel around the IC. Mine is pretty thick and tapered and I think the newest one is less thick and much more even.

My wife's has the older low res IC (P28xxx). It's definitely noticeable vs previous firmware.

 

[Cyclone]

My wife's has the older low res IC (P28xxx). It's definitely noticeable vs previous firmware.

Well there goes the theory that your wife's car had the newer high res IC and that was source of your and mknox's perception differences. Thankfully, I'm happy w/ my low res IC's performance (reminded of that every time I have a loaner), so I should be happy either way in v7.

 

[tinm]

Wow, such negativity! Your fundamental assumption may be wrong! AFAIK Tesla does log and register issues/complaints that are emailed to @service or @sales. Now, I know some people are insulted that they don't get a form letter back saying "we read your...". Or a personalized credit in the release notes. Or a thank you tweet from Musk. Thing is, when you have 100k+ cars on the road, you have to monitor trends, not single data points. Knowing that Tesla peruses this forum (as well as their own) and that many have written their concerns, I suspect they have received the message regarding v7 shortcomings that need to be addressed in future releases. That doesn't mean everybody's pet peeve will be addressed, but I suspect near future release will alleviate vast majority. If I'm wrong, you can then come back and say "I told you so, they don't listen".

• "Your fundamental assumption may be wrong"

• "As far as I know"

• "I suspect" (twice)

You make my point for me.

You don't know. I don't know. Nobody knows.

Because Tesla doesn't tell us. They don't know how to communicate well with customers, so we are in the dark. They've never communicated well with customers. The lack of any evidence that they're addressing this long-time weakness suggests that it is only going to get worse as time goes on and the number of customers increases.

What they're doing with 7.0 is classic software industry behavior. I get it. I've been there, done that. The problem is, you can't act like a software company, but use an automobile company's methods of communication. Tesla is more software than hardware. It's a computer on wheels, we all know that. It needs *support* people. It needs a hotline for owners. It needs a ticketing system for tracking every communication from a customer, every question, request, inquiry, report, concern, and every promise and status update and report from the company back to customers. This is not rocket science. Smart companies do this already. Tesla doesn't need purported employees purportedly monitoring TMC and its own message forums. It needs to engage its customers. We are stakeholders. We matter. Tesla needs to have the support infrastructure of a software company in addition to the service infrastructure of an auto company. They chose to build the damn thing as a computer on wheels, and so they gotta deal with it that way. And they're not. It's gonna cost them.

 

[tomas]

• "Your fundamental assumption may be wrong"

• "As far as I know"

• "I suspect" (twice)

You make my point for me.

You don't know. I don't know. Nobody knows.

Because Tesla doesn't tell us. They don't know how to communicate well with customers, so we are in the dark. They've never communicated well with customers. The lack of any evidence that they're addressing this long-time weakness suggests that it is only going to get worse as time goes on and the number of customers increases.

What they're doing with 7.0 is classic software industry behavior. I get it. I've been there, done that. The problem is, you can't act like a software company, but use an automobile company's methods of communication. Tesla is more software than hardware. It's a computer on wheels, we all know that. It needs *support* people. It needs a hotline for owners. It needs a ticketing system for tracking those trends. It doesn't need purported employees purportedly monitoring TMC and its own message forums. It needs to engage its customers. We are stakeholders. We matter. Tesla needs to have the support infrastructure of a software company in addition to the service infrastructure of an auto company. They chose to build the damn thing as a computer on wheels, and so they gotta deal with it that way. And they're not. It's gonna cost them.

OK, no weasel words here. Your assumption is wrong. They do listen to customers. They do log and attempt to correctly distribute @support and @sales contacts. And, they do monitor this and other forums. They also consider that along with a lot of other feedback from their sales and service people, as well as their product strategy, to prioritize development.

It is an extremely long jump to note that they changed @ownership to @service and @sales, and thereby assume they are not listening to owners.

You may not be happy with their prioritization. That's your prerogative. You may not believe they are putting enough resources to software development. Again, your prerogative.

I'd only say they are a ton better than any other car company I've dealt with. How about the known faulty BMW HVAC system that they haven't addressed for 12 years? Try making sure your feedback to them got past a dealer to someone who matters?

Yes, they're building software. And could act more like a software company. But, they're also building a car, so in some ways have to act like a car company.

Hopefully you'll get what you want when Apple ships a car.

 

[alexucf]

Glad you like the new UI, as do I. A question: I've noticed a few TMC member ps refer to a "HUD". In my experience, that acronym stands for Head Up a Display. See Head-up display - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Is that what you mean? If so, as far as I know Tesla has never built a car with a HUD. Or do you mean something else by using "HUD"? My reading of your post is that you are referring to the display in front of the driver just above the steering column. But that is not a HUD, based on how the term is commonly used.

I just started calling it that b/c everyone else seems to call it that. Seemed easier than typing "the display above the steering column", and I doubt TDATSC would mean anything to anyone

 

[tinm]

Hopefully you'll get what you want when Apple ships a car.

Ha, the last thing I would ever buy is an Apple car!

 

[mknox]

Pro: There was one good functional change, literally the ONLY such change I found....you can unlock the door now from the main screen.

It seems everyone has forgotten, or didn't know, that you can do this when parked by simply pressing the Park button (even if the car is already in Park). Not sure why you'd want to do it when the car is in Drive or Reverse, but maybe somebody does. I find hitting the Park button a lot quicker and more intuitive than pecking at a tiny screen icon.

 

[Gizmotoy]

It seems everyone has forgotten, or didn't know, that you can do this when parked by simply pressing the Park button (even if the car is already in Park). Not sure why you'd want to do it when the car is in Drive or Reverse, but maybe somebody does. I find hitting the Park button a lot quicker and more intuitive than pecking at a tiny screen icon.

As the driver I wouldn't use it, but I think it'll be useful for a passenger. Especially one not intimately familiar with the vehicle.

 

[kort677]

As the driver I wouldn't use it, but I think it'll be useful for a passenger. Especially one not intimately familiar with the vehicle.

the lock was the first thing that my wife noticed the first time she rode in the car after the changes, I always seem to forget to go into park when picking her up so this was of interest to her, she said "now you can let me in without stopping:wink:

 

[mknox]

As the driver I wouldn't use it, but I think it'll be useful for a passenger. Especially one not intimately familiar with the vehicle.

Right. I drive alone so much of the time I forget that the car can carry passengers too :smile: The only thing is that if there is a passenger in the car without the driver, the screens are usually off, and if I'm in the driver's seat, I really don't want passengers reaching over to the controls (i.e. screen). But yes, most cars do have door lock/unlock buttons on both the driver's and passenger's side. Odd choice though, to put that button way over on the driver's side of the screen.

 

[islandbayy]

Just updated out of Necessity. I wanted to hold off for a long time, however, after my 3rd drive unit gave me a scare Friday, Engeneering reviewed the logs and said V7 would fix it. So Reluctantly, I updated (Rather then getting stranded someplace). I seriously doubt the firmware will fix the issue I had with my DU, as every other reference to the same problem and errors resulted in a DU Replacement. So I just went out to the car and played with the V7 a bit more (Limited time last week on a friends "Classic S" to play with V7).
SERIOUSLY! I would have rather risked more DU Glitches then upgrading to this CRAP. I'm sorry to say it, But I am a more vocal person about things when someone F's Them up.
This is a Royal F-Up. Crap in every sense of the word. Am I hurting Feelings? Yes, am I going to take crap for my opinions, Yep. But they are my opinions, and I will voice them. This is the biggest step backwards.... This interface is just Crap, Literal, Stinky, Royal Crap. I feel like I'm driving a Windows 3.1 car now....... But then, even Windows 3.1 looked and functioned better then this....

This is no longer the car I purchased, Not in a Good Sense. I would rather go back 2 1/2 years to Firmware 4.2 and loose all progress since. Actually, 4.2 was the most stable version I've ever had in my car. Auto worked, no bugs, snappier accel, better Regen. Only thing was slightly slower Superchargign (70kW limited on 60's and 90kW limited on 85's). But, ya know what, EVERYTHING WORKED, and EVERYTHING LOOKED GOOD!!!. They changed the original Dash screen look to the more flattened version around V5.6ish, and now this. It's been a progression to Crap since.


Sorry/Not Sorry for those whose feeling I've hurt. I hope everyone realizes that when I have a opinion, I will be brutally honest. I do not sugarcoat things. This, version, really, does, suck.

 

[jerry33]

It is an extremely long jump to note that they changed @ownership to @service and @sales, and thereby assume they are not listening to owners.

It may be a long jump but it certainly gives the impression that Tesla cares far less about its customers then it used to. Removing a communications channel and those who monitored it doesn't imply better responsiveness.

 

[Tslynk67]

Regarding the lock/park discussion... Does the park button on the selector stalk still present the door handles? This I would like to disable. Quite often I was to put the parking brake on, without the doors obviously becoming unlocked.

 

[jerry33]

Regarding the lock/park discussion... Does the park button on the selector stalk still present the door handles? This I would like to disable. Quite often I was to put the parking brake on, without the doors obviously becoming unlocked.

Sure does. Used it last night.

 

[mknox]

Regarding the lock/park discussion... Does the park button on the selector stalk still present the door handles? This I would like to disable. Quite often I was to put the parking brake on, without the doors obviously becoming unlocked.

Yes, it still presents the handles, but presumably you're unlocking the car to let someone in from the outside, so you'd need the handles. You can open the door normally from the inside whether is is "locked" or not.

A few firmware versions ago, they changed this a bit. I have found if I stop in my driveway to let my wife out, then pull the few feet in to my garage, when I press Park in the garage, the brake comes on, but the handles don't extend.

I wish that the car would never present the handle when I go in to park because usually it means I and any passengers are getting out. If I want the handles, let me do it with a second tap on the Park button. And while we're at it, I wish when I approach the car, only the driver's handle extends.

 

[joefee]

Sig 791 - No update as of 11am today.