Holiday Update (2021.44.25.2)- A Big Disappointment

[Duncan Parks]

How is it hard to press arrow next to the temp number and lil pop up shows you defogger and other things. Yeah very unsafe lol.
Little advice try to explore new things before you start big claims of how it is unsafe and etc.

Of course I found it, but that's an extra half-second of inattention to the road if you're doing 60 and the windshield starts to fog. Tesla controls are already bad enough given that there is no tactile feedback at all (you actually have to look at the screen to do anything), but now you have to look at the screen twice. That is absolutely a safety issue - driver inattention quite literally kills people.

If it's doing something with the entertainment system, submenu away. But essential controls need to be quick and easy to access. The designers of the previous UI understood that.

 

[Madsen203]

Of course I found it, but that's an extra half-second of inattention to the road if you're doing 60 and the windshield starts to fog. Tesla controls are already bad enough given that there is no tactile feedback at all (you actually have to look at the screen to do anything), but now you have to look at the screen twice. That is absolutely a safety issue - driver inattention quite literally kills people.

If it's doing something with the entertainment system, submenu away. But essential controls need to be quick and easy to access.

I still say they are quick and easy to access and you’re driving too fast if you can’t handle 1 second of eye contact off the road. That’s like saying checking your blind spot is dangerous because you have to turn your head over your shoulder. It literally takes a fraction of a second to turn on any of the “safety”
Features.


Good on folks realizing it’s not as bad as initially perceived. It will improve but overall not a bad update and much of it is actually for the better.

 

[GOVA]

The more I use it the more I like it. Just a learning curve. I have no negative reactions - it certainly looks better.

First of all, thanks for asking. It seemed like this is one big disagree pool.

There are many things actually but overall I think it does work better.

The dark theme is solid, works great during the day and it is not overdone. The temperature controls make more sense now. I live in 4 season climate and use all. The ability to add/remove icons is welcome too. Works very similar to andorid tablet.

This is always a learning curve once a new interface is reworked. I think that with time it will improve even more.

Finally, I am still hoping that I'll be able to adjust wiper speed with scroll whell eventually. The auto-wiper has been bad and I find myself constanlty adjusting it via clicks. This is not optimal.

In any case, I don't like people dismissing a new thing only because it is new. Lots of posts seem to bitch endlessly like this has been a total disaster. It is not so.

 

[S3XY1138]

Precisely.
I live in an area where it gets cold in the winter. I don’t need games in the toolbar, I need seat heater controls.
I used to have the odometer displayed on the lower left whenever I drive, changeable to tire pressure with a swipe. Useful information in a good location on the screen. Now when you want to see the odometer it covers the entire right side of the screen. Useless.
I use text messages every time I drive. The old display position and font size was fine. Why did this change?

There are so many bad choices Tesla made. I really don’t understand what they were thinking.

People who drive a 60K+ self driving car complaining about having to hit their touch screens twice instead of one time to heat their buns? Wow

 

[WhiteWi]

Of course I found it, but that's an extra half-second of inattention to the road if you're doing 60 and the windshield starts to fog. Tesla controls are already bad enough given that there is no tactile feedback at all (you actually have to look at the screen to do anything), but now you have to look at the screen twice. That is absolutely a safety issue - driver inattention quite literally kills people.

If it's doing something with the entertainment system, submenu away. But essential controls need to be quick and easy to access. The designers of the previous UI understood that.

If you set your ac to auto you almost never will need to press defog!

 

[sleepydoc]

Good on folks realizing it’s not as bad as initially perceived. It will improve but overall not a bad update

The problem is, it’s worse than what it replaced. What does 44.25 give us?

• Improvements in FSD/autopilot
• Blind spot monitoring of dubious utility
• The ability to add waypoints on a trip
• A ‘light show’
• Customizable controls*
• A display ’simplified to focus on navigation, media and the most commonly used controls’*
• TikTok
• Several games
• Automated seat heaters
• Dark mode

What have we lost?

• The ability to easily see and control the seat heaters
• The ability to easily see the trip odometer
• The ability to easily see the tire pressure
• The ability to easily see/control the driver profile settings
• The ability to quickly and easily turn on the front defroster
• The ability to quickly and easily turn on the rear defroster
• The estimated charge remaining on navigation
• The ability to easily see cell reception
• The ability to quickly change the map view

If you look at the list, you’ll notice a theme - most of we ’gained’ was frivolous crap that doesn’t improve the driving experience but everything we ‘lost’ made the UI more difficult to use across the board. Furthermore, none of what was supposedly gained actually required the any changes in the UI. I have seen no one claim that the defroster icons, driver profile, cell reception icon, etc were obtrusive or otherwise interfered with their ability to drive. Tesla could have made the seat heater Icons removable for the poor souls that live in Florida and were forced to look at them them every day.

I put an asterisk by customizable controls and the display that focused on ’most commonly used controls’ because those ’improvements’ are actually red herrings. The display decidedly does not focus on the most commonly used controls, as evidenced by the cacophony of complaints here. The ‘customizable display’ is technically customizable, but most of the customizations are useless and completely omit the ‘most commonly used funcitons’ that people need.

Can any of the people who doggedly defend this abomination please explain to me why we should have icons for Theater, Arcade, and Toybox front and center, while hiding the seat heater and defroster controls? Why do we even need TikTok in a car at all?

Another point that is missed here is that the touchscreen display makes the interface intrinsically more difficult to use. The tactile feedback that you have with physical controls is lost so actions which one can do in other cars without looking require the driver to look away from the road when using a touchscreen. The previous UI minimized the impact of this but moving things to submenus definitely makes it worse.

 

[sleepydoc]

People who drive a 60K+ self driving car complaining about having to hit their touch screens twice instead of one time to heat their buns? Wow

No, people who drive a $60K+ self driving car complaining that they got a crap interface more befitting a Toyota Yaris.

 

[S3XY1138]

No, people who drive a $60K+ self driving car complaining that they got a crap interface more befitting a Toyota Yaris.

i disagree

 

[S3XY1138]

What have we lost?

• The ability to easily see and control the seat heaters
• The ability to easily see the trip odometer
• The ability to easily see the tire pressure
• The ability to easily see/control the driver profile settings
• The ability to quickly and easily turn on the front defroster
• The ability to quickly and easily turn on the rear defroster
• The estimated charge remaining on navigation
• The ability to easily see cell reception
• The ability to quickly change the map view

I can easily and quickly do all of these complaints. Why can’t you?

 

[BreatheEasier]

The problem is, it’s worse than what it replaced. What does 44.25 give us?

• Improvements in FSD/autopilot
• Blind spot monitoring of dubious utility
• The ability to add waypoints on a trip
• A ‘light show’
• Customizable controls*
• A display ’simplified to focus on navigation, media and the most commonly used controls’*
• TikTok
• Several games
• Automated seat heaters
• Dark mode

What have we lost?

• The ability to easily see and control the seat heaters
• The ability to easily see the trip odometer
• The ability to easily see the tire pressure
• The ability to easily see/control the driver profile settings
• The ability to quickly and easily turn on the front defroster
• The ability to quickly and easily turn on the rear defroster
• The estimated charge remaining on navigation
• The ability to easily see cell reception
• The ability to quickly change the map view

If you look at the list, you’ll notice a theme - most of we ’gained’ was frivolous crap that doesn’t improve the driving experience but everything we ‘lost’ made the UI more difficult to use across the board. Furthermore, none of what was supposedly gained actually required the any changes in the UI. I have seen no one claim that the defroster icons, driver profile, cell reception icon, etc were obtrusive or otherwise interfered with their ability to drive. Tesla could have made the seat heater Icons removable for the poor souls that live in Florida and were forced to look at them them every day.

I put an asterisk by customizable controls and the display that focused on ’most commonly used controls’ because those ’improvements’ are actually red herrings. The display decidedly does not focus on the most commonly used controls, as evidenced by the cacophony of complaints here. The ‘customizable display’ is technically customizable, but most of the customizations are useless and completely omit the ‘most commonly used funcitons’ that people need.

Can any of the people who doggedly defend this abomination please explain to me why we should have icons for Theater, Arcade, and Toybox front and center, while hiding the seat heater and defroster controls? Why do we even need TikTok in a car at all?

Another point that is missed here is that the touchscreen display makes the interface intrinsically more difficult to use. The tactile feedback that you have with physical controls is lost so actions which one can do in other cars without looking require the driver to look away from the road when using a touchscreen. The previous UI minimized the impact of this but moving things to submenus definitely makes it worse.

Agree 100% that your list of what we "lost" is driving my wife and I nuts. We are trying to use voice controls, but they only work 50% of the time, at best. I look at the tire pressures all the time as the warm/cold weather fluctuations this year have been so severe that I've found myself topping up my tires many times to regain range after pressure losses. Now it is a PITA to find quickly. Sharing the car with my wife, with our 2 profiles configured and both using 'phone as a key', about 50% of the time the car guesses correctly and we have to go into the settings to change profiles as hers is much different than mine. I'm hoping there is enough negative feedback that much of this is configurable to bring back by users....

 

[DadRS99]

Joined to add my voice to this - I agree with all the negative reviews of this update. I'm a software developer and UX professional, and model 3 owner for 2+ years. I loved the original tesla UI (prior to this update) exactly for it's usability and design. It had things that could be improved, such as the swipe cards for tire pressure and odometer not working reliably. And I understand the desire to declutter the screen, but in UX, one-click is FAR FAR more usable than two-click, so frequently used things, like bluetooth, cell, wifi, air temp, seat heaters, defrost buttons, should never be changed from one to two click, if screen real-estate is sufficient. And screen real-estate is more than sufficient in these cars! So it does show very inexperienced UX/UI designers are calling the shots in the Tesla software UI team. I personally don't blame them as everyone has to learn, but it is the responsibility of the leaders of the company to ensure they have sufficiently experienced people in place to coach and help those more junior people learn.

I do agree there is a reduced level of safety in this update. Operating a moving vehicle is very different from using a smartphone or tablet, this really shouldn't have to be pointed out. All it takes is to get someone from Tesla who *didn't* design these screen changes to go for a test drive prior to releasing the update, it's immediately clear that these changes do have an impact how how many seconds you need to take your attention off the road.

- The seatbelt diagram is horizontal, making is almost impossible to figure out which person doesn't have a belt on.
- The side mirror view is blocked by the drivers hand, it should be larger and placed at the top of the screen.
- The recent apps is a terrible idea - I don't want a set of random icons displayed permanently on screen, where I may never use them again for months.
- The monochrome icons were far easier to distinguish than the colorized versions, and they looked better, and more professional.
- The split of music sources to separate apps, and the implementation of the whole music feature is a bungle.
- The app to stream audio from a phone is called 'Bluetooth' with a bluetooth icon, which I associate with bluetooth settings.
- Removal of the driver profile name from the main screen, and not being able to switch and update profiles from the main screen is a mistake.
- The bold font size is less readable and looks amature.
- The ridiculously small font size and mini-icons for defrost on the air-con buttons in the tray are misleading and cluttered.
- The split air-con is a huge waste of space. Air-con in the most important button on the screen. Put it back in the middle, and put split settings in the larger popup area with all the other settings.
- Wipers, since auto does *not* function properly, must be accessible by one-click at all times.


Wow, seriously let down by this update. Makes me sad every time I get in the car now. I used to love this car, but now not as much. I hope Tesla addresses this in the next update very soon.

+ 1 on being sad when I get in. The font and app icons look so amateurish.

Also to add the quick blind spot video goes off to quickly if you just briefly press the turn signal for three blinks - the video is gone before you’ve actually made the turn!

 

[sleepydoc]

i disagree

yup- that interface is actually more functional than Tesla's. It's also easier to turn on the defroster in the Yaris. And use the blind spot monitoring...

Like I said, if Tesla is going to do away with physical controls and make you look away from the road, they have an obligation to design a good interface.

 

[sleepydoc]

I can easily and quickly do all of these complaints. Why can’t you?

Are you actually arguing that it's easier to do all of these than it was before????

 

[S3XY1138]

yup- that interface is actually more functional than Tesla's. It's also easier to turn on the defroster in the Yaris. And use the blind spot monitoring...

Like I said, if Tesla is going to do away with physical controls and make you look away from the road, they have an obligation to design a good interface.

Are you actually arguing that the Toyota Yaris is more advanced than a Tesla?

 

[Mourron]

Why is it that the HVAC Auto button changes from grey to blue to indicate "auto" mode is activated. Yet the "auto" seat heaters change from grey to a shade BRIGHTER GREY to indicate auto mode?

Wtf? Can we at least have some consistency FFS?

 

[TomServo]

After living with it for a week now I still wonder about some of the decisions made, but it's clear the fix is staring them in the face. It's the App Launcher and Launch Bar while all the Non Driving/Comfort apps are nice, Tesla can easily add back most of the functions moved to other menu trees. Let the driver decide if Heated Seats is more important than TicTok, of Tire Pressures over Theater, then the owner can easily select the apps he wants to be displayed and easily accessible in the Launch Bar for a fully customized UI.

The folks that want the Entertainment apps front and center will be happy and the folks that want the driving/vehicle status and comfort apps front and center will be happy.

WIN-WIN

​

 

[DanDi58]

I actually like the look of the UI, especially in Dark Mode (which has fixed one of my minor peeves - not being able to see how far along a song is as the progress bar, in Light Mode, is dark against the Launch Bar which is also dark. In Dark Mode it's perfectly visible!). But yes, I'd like them to remove the 'recently used apps' area (or at least let ME get rid of the icons there - and expand the customizable area to beyond 4 apps. Even just adjust the spacer a bit like you can in Windows on the task bar. The more customizable, the better.

 

[rjpjnk]

As one of the ones who initially said this update was worse than the old UI, I have gotten used to it while driving for the past few days. I just need the ability to be able to adjust the homescreen as i prefer and to add any toggles or icons.

My thoughts as well. I like it now and feel it is an improvement over v10, but it really needs more customizable icons.

 

[rjpjnk]

The dark theme is solid, works great during the day and it is not overdone. The temperature controls make more sense now. I live in 4 season climate and use all. The ability to add/remove icons is welcome too. Works very similar to andorid tablet.

I like the dark mode in day as well, but is this mode any different that the Night Mode we already had on v10? To my recollection it looks the same, so I don't understand why it is listed as a new feature.

 

[rjpjnk]

If you set your ac to auto you almost never will need to press defog!

Agreed, auto handles this well. But then it keeps blowing heated air out the dashboard vents instead of towards the floor. Wish there was a way to retain all the automatic functionality but still direct the air to the floor.