Welcome to Tesla Motors Club
Discuss Tesla's Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y, Cybertruck, Roadster and More.
Register

Playing Movie on the Touchscreen?

This site may earn commission on affiliate links.
Hi there, I just saw a video on yt of a movie playing on the tesla model S touchscreen with a really decent quality of both image/sound and I'm very curious how can it be done, knowing of course that we can't play videos on the touchscreen?

I tried to contact the guy but no answers (yet?) and after seeing some threads about people trying to use their smartphone/tablets with the rear facing cam, I strongly think that it wasn't that solution employed for one crucial detail; at 0;14 on the video we can see a small scrolling bar, it seems to control forward and backward into the movie

here's the link of the video for you guys:
 
It's definitely not a screen held up to the rear camera — there'd be a lot of distortion.

I thought the same, and it would be impossible to get that "scrolling bar" in realtime, even more with the fact that the movie fastforward without anything being touch on the touchscreen, maybe a mirroring app/software?

Tesla disables it because of legal compliance and not a technological problem.

Thus, a technological competent person should be able to that too.

May be when Full Self-Driving feature is activated, that legal restriction will be lifted too so all of us can enjoy in-car movies :)

I really hope so! Maybe he bypassed a restriction but only on full stop/parking mode? Even though it's only available like that I'd gladly have it hahaha
 
I'm betting on some sort of blue/green screen or post-production shenanigans! Glad to be proven wrong - but this has been up since Sept 2016 and if it's real, I'm surprised no one on this forum has seen it or discussed any way to get live video on the center screen.

You could do a green screen easily just putting a green paper in front of the rear view camera then replacing that in video-editing. That said, it looks very convincing -- hoping this is real and the author posts a how-to!
 
  • Helpful
Reactions: Kuhz
I'm betting on some sort of blue/green screen or post-production shenanigans!

I don't think this is the case because it's easy to do if you know how.

To refresh, Tesla does run on a Linux-based system.

What you need to do is to access Tesla Developer Mode screens.

TOUXlWM.jpg


Then gain root access to the operating system.

You can then insert your Gentoo Linux-based system.

kQLvLBN.jpg


Get the Xfce lightweight desktop environment.

Don't forget your Advanced Linux Sound Architecture.

And don't forget your drivers for Nvidia Tegra ....

And then you can play with smplayer.info

If you have any doubt, ask the author:

Hemera (@su_hemera) | Twitter

Ch93GC7XIAMxeYE.jpg:large
 
Last edited:
Many years ago the BMW 7 series came with a TV receiver and you could watch TV as long as the car was in P. Due to legal issues they disabled the TV/video once you start driving. Would be very easy for Tesla to make that work.

Rather than supporting video I wish Tesla would finally support Car Play or whatever it's called, where the touch screen basically mirrors the phone screen. This way you can use all apps and features of your phone.
 
I don't think this is the case because it's easy to do if you know how.

To refresh, Tesla does run on a Linux-based system.

What you need to do is to access Tesla Developer Mode screens.

TOUXlWM.jpg


Then gain root access to the operating system.

You can then insert your Gentoo Linux-based system.

kQLvLBN.jpg


Get the Xfce lightweight desktop environment.

Don't forget your Advanced Linux Sound Architecture.

And don't forget your drivers for Nvidia Tegra ....

And then you can play with smplayer.info

If you have any doubt, ask the author:

Hemera (@su_hemera) | Twitter

Ch93GC7XIAMxeYE.jpg:large

Woaw thx a lot for all these informations that's useful knowledge! I'm not a developper so I guess I'm not qualified enough to do the whole procedure but maybe the author can provide an automated process via an app or a step by step detailled tutorial?

One thing I'd love to be implemented in a near future is just 2 screens on the back of each front seat for the backseat passengers, and getting a full independant control on the screens while still having the "parent-children" relation with the touchscreen acting as the base.
Is it pure fantasy that if for instance I buy 2 small screen to get them connected to the system to achieve that I've just described above?
 
Yes this was almost certainly accomplished by rooting the OS. In the video you can see the driver profile is 'root'.

how can you see it? Is it at 0:20 sec of the video when he's switching back and forth in some menus?


Many years ago the BMW 7 series came with a TV receiver and you could watch TV as long as the car was in P. Due to legal issues they disabled the TV/video once you start driving. Would be very easy for Tesla to make that work.

Rather than supporting video I wish Tesla would finally support Car Play or whatever it's called, where the touch screen basically mirrors the phone screen. This way you can use all apps and features of your phone.

+1 as an iOS devices owner (iphone/ipad) I'd really would like that feature
 
My previous car (a Lexus LS 460) had a DVD player that would play videos to the console display, when the car wasn't moving. There was a hack available to disable the motion detection - and get the video to display on the console, when the car was moving (though that may have broken the navigation system!).

It's probably not too difficult to take over the rear camera feed. Though because of the audio delay introduced by the Tesla media player, routing the audio through Bluetooth would probably result in the audio being out of sync with the video.

In a few years, when FSD is approved for use, the restriction on video while moving will likely go away, when the car is operating in FSD mode.

It would be useful for Tesla to lift the video restriction when the car is stationary - and allow the console display to be used to display videos from local and internet sources - and then when FSD is approved, remove the motion detection restriction.
 
how can you see it? Is it at 0:20 sec of the video when he's switching back and forth in some menus?




+1 as an iOS devices owner (iphone/ipad) I'd really would like that feature
No, at the start of the video, at the top of the screen is the word 'Root' thats the driver profile. Now, anybody can make a profile and name it 'root', but this car is definitely in root mode running the root profile, as there is no other way todo this.
 
No, at the start of the video, at the top of the screen is the word 'Root' thats the driver profile. Now, anybody can make a profile and name it 'root', but this car is definitely in root mode running the root profile, as there is no other way todo this.

I was wondering: does it void the warranty to root your car? I mean like a smartphone you can restore to factory settings, so would Tesla notice it, via their computer for instance on the annual check-up?
 
I was wondering: does it void the warranty to root your car? I mean like a smartphone you can restore to factory settings, so would Tesla notice it, via their computer for instance on the annual check-up?

Depends on the country and the local laws. There have been cases here in the US where the manufacturer tried to void the warranty based on some modification, but the court decided that modifying one part doesn't affect the rest of the car so the warranty is still in place except the modified part. Rooting isn't any different than what the service center does when working on your car to check logs and other functions. The burden of proof that the modification has caused an issue is on the manufacturer's side.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Tesl-anonymous
Doesn't AP1 software run on the console processor?

If that's true, it's also likely the current AP2 software is also running on the console processor right now.

Rooting the console processor would seem like a bad idea...