Correct. “Idling” is using minimal power. I second the recommendation of using abetterrouteplanner. It should alleviate some of that fear. It’s terribly accurate if you give it good data.
You don't need to "get to know" anything about the Supercharger locations. Just get in your car and plug in where you want to go. if you need to stop to charge the car will route you there...if you can't get there the car will let you know. If you run through your battery faster than planned it will warn you to stay below a certain speed to make it to your destination. if your destination comes and you have less than desirable range left then route to the nearest supercharger.
Idling costs very little (unless super cold out and your running the heat high). It can actually help to be stuck in traffic as it brings road speed (and thus wind drag) down.
The car is actually really good at estimating range. The built in navigation will tell you what the arrival percentage will be for the intended destination. If you touch the map it will show three additional icons - one of which is the charging locations. From there you can select one of the Austin Superchargers and the car will tell you what your arrival charge will be.
The arrival percentage might fluctuate during your drive, depending on if you're driving faster or slower than the rated speed limit that it uses to determine consumption along the route. If it goes down very quickly you can back off your speed and it will come back up.
You can set the navigation to Austin before you even put it in Drive and see what the arrival percentage will be. Hopefully that'll help ease your range anxiety. The only way to find out is to do it
With only a few exceptions, ALL Teslas should be able to make it between any two adjacent interstate Supercharger locations without any problem.
There's a decent sized caveat to that recommendation though. The car's navigation can't yet do multi-point routing. So, if you're going to be driving round-trip without superchargers along the route or going to a third location off the direct route from A-to-B, the car can't reliably say whether you'll have sufficient charge to make it. Which is why people in this thread are suggesting the use of 3rd party EV trip planners (e.g. A Better Route Planner) that can tell you whether your full route is feasible or not. For a straight drive, a new owner relying on the car's navigation is as easy as you say. For anything beyond that, knowing whether you can make it or where along the way you'll need some charging does require you to "get to know" the car. Things like how efficiently it uses energy in various weathers and road conditions, what settings and driving styles/techniques will best limit energy use, etc. Learning all of that will come with time and experience. In the meantime, new owners should rely on the good tools available to supplement their planning. And experienced owners shouldn't blithely tell them to "just plug in where you want to go" without a little caution or more context.
BUT! Stopping for the charge will be a good educational experience. It's all so stupidly simple that I laughed out loud the first couple times I used a Supercharger.
