And yet, I can't help but feel that a $25K number is a scare tactic. If I can buy a third party CarPlay LCD at Best Buy for $250, Tesla can make an upgrade which costs less than $25K.
I gave that as an example on the expensive side. From what we know today, you'd need:
1. New central display unit (was Tegra, now Intel)
2. New instrument cluster (was different Tegra, now seems to run on Tegra)
3. New mirrors with additional antennas
4. New security module (handles keys)
5. New Wifi module (speculation)
6. New wiring harnesses
What if the new display unit or instrument cluster was optimized and requires different mounting, what if it requires larger space behind (want to have a new MCU sticking out 1/2 inch?). Want to add to is a new chasis replacement with proper dash mounts? If you want to just retrofit, now you have to recertify/crash test etc, to make sure its still save (can't just screw in some plastic brackets or drill new holes and hope for the best). What if there were other optimizations/changes?
All these can add up to quiet a bit of parts and labor, not to mention paying someone to design the retrofit procedure and then train all the techs in all SC's - all costs that must be passed down to the customers paying for the upgrade.
Heck, they could take the original MCU box, swap out the Tegra board for an Intel board which ran Tegra ARM code under software emulation, keep all external connectors the same, and it would still be a huge improvement.
LOL, you're obviously not an engineer or at least never designed anything like this (and then had to support it for 15 years) - now that would be EXPENSIVE, and yet offer you no new functionality (say using your phone as a key). If it's just speed you are after, cheaper and faster than designing and optimizing such an "emulation board" would to simply go back and rewrite the Tegra software. the IVI runs on a Tegra 3, which is the same chip you find in the original Microsoft Surface. I have to say, other than lack of Flash support, the UI was very responsive and so was the browser (I still have one, still very responsive). Of course you may say that Windows is somehow faster than Linux but I'll let you fight that battle with plenty of Linux superfans out there.