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Poll: Is FSD Worth the Cost?

Which is the best value for the Model 3?


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    639
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Either that or they need to install sensors that can tell the difference between a shadow and a 3D object.

Something like #6?

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The problems I see with the current system is it seems to be largely blind to oncoming cars making an illegal left where there coming in at an angle. Next but to a lesser extent is where they’re going through and red and hitting you from the side.

People making illegal lefts or running red are quite common. I don’t know if anyone else who’s been going out during the lockdowns has noticed but with the roads being a lot less empty people seem to be paying even less attention and I’ve been seeing a LOT more accidents and near accidents. I used to rarely hear fire sirens around from my house. Now it’s not uncommon to hear them a few times a day, granted not every day.

The system is pretty good with things immediately in front, followed by behind, and eventually immediately to your side. But there are still too many huge gaps in visibility regardless if it’s for general safety of high speed accident avoidance or just general slow speed small object or minor impact avoidance.
 
The problems I see with the current system is it seems to be largely blind to oncoming cars making an illegal left where there coming in at an angle. Next but to a lesser extent is where they’re going through and red and hitting you from the side.

People making illegal lefts or running red are quite common. I don’t know if anyone else who’s been going out during the lockdowns has noticed but with the roads being a lot less empty people seem to be paying even less attention and I’ve been seeing a LOT more accidents and near accidents. I used to rarely hear fire sirens around from my house. Now it’s not uncommon to hear them a few times a day, granted not every day.

The system is pretty good with things immediately in front, followed by behind, and eventually immediately to your side. But there are still too many huge gaps in visibility regardless if it’s for general safety of high speed accident avoidance or just general slow speed small object or minor impact avoidance.

True. The fans of FSD are very focused on what FSD can do, but the things it can’t do, like what you are describing, are lightyears (and several generations of hardware) away from being solved.
 
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The problems I see with the current system is it seems to be largely blind to oncoming cars making an illegal left where there coming in at an angle. Next but to a lesser extent is where they’re going through and red and hitting you from the side.

The system has 360 degree visibility. It can absolutely see those things (Greentheonly has even posted post-crash videos showing you can clearly see the oncoming car from the car cameras).


But currently is explicitly not intended to be used to handle intersections at all (other than stopping for lights/stop signs)- and not intended to handle, at all, oncoming, or cross, traffic in any way.

That's still 100% the drivers responsibility right now.
 
i had the same experience as you, NOA drives like an moron. anyone who says differently is wrong or doesnt know how to drive lol. Its more of a party trick at the moment, FSD is nowhere near done in my opinion.

Anyone who says differently is disagreeing with you .. they are not wrong, except in your opinion, which may itself be wrong.
 
The problems I see with the current system is it seems to be largely blind to oncoming cars making an illegal left where there coming in at an angle. Next but to a lesser extent is where they’re going through and red and hitting you from the side.

I think the issue right now, has less to do with the cameras and sensors, and more with the current state of the software and NN development. The rewrite is supposed to allow for more accurate labeling among other improvements. So, we'll have to wait and see what it has in store. It could very well require more hardware in the future, but it's too early to tell at this point.
 
I think the issue right now, has less to do with the cameras and sensors, and more with the current state of the software and NN development. The rewrite is supposed to allow for more accurate labeling among other improvements. So, we'll have to wait and see what it has in store. It could very well require more hardware in the future, but it's too early to tell at this point.

Has Musk given “any” indication as to when the NN / software rewrote Could “possibly” see light of date?
 
I drove 14 months and 34k miles with EAP before my LRAWD decided that enough was enough and ended it's life by running over road debris. In that time, I used NOA extensively, and advanced summon only a few times. I used lane change on signal, autosteer and TACC daily for thousands of miles. My car was a November 2018 build on HW 2.5.

I bought a March 2020 Performance with HW3. It's now got a little over 1,000 miles on it and there are only two things I can say I miss: dumb summon and lane change on signal.

Dumb summon, to me, was very useful for tight parking spots, moving the car back in the garage a bit, etc. Fantastic, I used it often. Smart summon was super sketchy to me. Maybe it has gotten better? I don't know. But my parking space at work is under a carport and it's next to a big metal post that's right on the B pillar line, so effectively invisible to the car since it only uses the U/S sensors when maneuvering. Once I saw the posts of people's cars running into garage posts and door jambs, that was it for me. Not to mention a few close calls with curb and curb islands.

Lane change on signal, I miss this although I do not miss it being wishy / washy. The more recent updates that made it more aggressive helped, but in the heavy traffic I drive in, quite often it was way too laggy and would not try to turn until the space was gone. I do miss this because changing lanes on Auto Steer is annoying, in that I have to re-activate Auto Steer with EVERY. SINGLE. LANE. CHANGE. I had to go to Joe mode just to stop all the "bing-bong-ing". Once you put on a turn signal, however, AS will disengage quite smoothly, so that is a plus.

Auto lane change...I tried that and turned it off. It would frequently fail to ask to pull out of the passing lane back into the travel lane. And would often wait a very long time when coming up on a slower car before suggesting to pull over. Often I'd be 10 MPH below my target speed, then have to wait for a clear opening, when it should have taken the opportunity long before.

NOA - well, that just wasn't very useful at all. Too early or too late to get over to exits. Rapid slow down in the travel lane before moving to the exit ramp frequently left me 10 MPH below the limit (or about 20 mph below actual travel speed) in the right lane a few hundred yards before the top of the ramp. Scary. Speeds on our long ramps here in Houston were very slow, and even slower in corners.

Add it all up and in no way was it worth the upgrade of $7k. I often thought that when FSD really started to do something, the only way I'd upgrade from EAP to FSD was to experience another owner's car and see if it were worth it. When Tesla starts selling it on subscription, I'll try it just to see how it is if the subscription term is short enough. And also to see if Lane Change on signal is better on HW3 than it was on HW 2.5.
 
There are 2 answers, depending why you consider FSD:
  1. For the value of today's features? No.
  2. Because you love living in the future and seeing your car do new MAGIC every 2-4 weeks? And you check TeslaFi for updates waiting for new MAGIC? And you realize they literally just started tapping the power of the FSD chip in April and believe that the MAGIC will continue for years? And if you are ok if FSD is never 100% perfect and autonomous, realizing that the joy is in the journey? Then HELL YES.
#TeamMagic
 
I sincerely applaud the brave souls that finance the autonomous future and risk their lives to train the neural nets. Bravo! No sarcasm.

My wife agrees with you. She only an occasional driver and the car scares her. I don't find myself feeling at risk at all. Because I geek out on it, that also means I'm always observing it and am always attuned and responsive to anything wrong. Took about 3 months to get to that point. On highways, my issue are almost always with etiquette, not safety.
 
If you have EAP, stick with that. The only difference right now between EAP and FSD is stopping at stop lights. I have FSD upgraded from EAP when the price was cheap : $2k not $7k.I am upgraded to hw 3.0. It is getting better every update. The clinch for me is the car parking itself in parking lots. FSD on streets is... a while away.
 
She only an occasional driver and the car scares her. I don't find myself feeling at risk at all.

You do sound like I should applaud you for training autopilot.

Unless it is stop and go traffic, or there's an open highway where I can see road debree and potholes from afar and consider a car changing lanes into me a very low probability event, I am on guard beyond what autopilot can react to in most situations.
I am glad I can turn AP on when I am tired or don't feel well to a degree when I think my ability to react could be below AP, on familiar stretches of the road, of course.

In all of these cases, having EAP, I am glad to be able to change lanes with a signal. But I would not have spent money on this if basic AP was available at the time I bought the car.

BTW, I do keep current on AP's "reflexes" and idiosyncrasies in case I need to use it.
BTW 2, if you were from Europe I would admit that I would be more comfortable using AP in more situations on _some_ roads.
 
You do sound like I should applaud you for training autopilot.

Unless it is stop and go traffic, or there's an open highway where I can see road debree and potholes from afar and consider a car changing lanes into me a very low probability event, I am on guard beyond what autopilot can react to in most situations.
I am glad I can turn AP on when I am tired or don't feel well to a degree when I think my ability to react could be below AP, on familiar stretches of the road, of course.

In all of these cases, having EAP, I am glad to be able to change lanes with a signal. But I would not have spent money on this if basic AP was available at the time I bought the car.

BTW, I do keep current on AP's "reflexes" and idiosyncrasies in case I need to use it.
BTW 2, if you were from Europe I would admit that I would be more comfortable using AP in more situations on _some_ roads.

My favorite part of this thread is how it illustrates why the technology is so awesome: nobody is forced to use it.

Everyone has their own comfort level behind the wheel, and the system provides as much assistance as we want or need. I think autopilot has some advantages with reaction time, but it's a mixed blessing because the system is virtually incapable of anticipating people's reactions. I'm absolutely certain it can brake faster for slowing or stopping traffic than a human driver, or even countersteer when an accident is imminent. Whether or not that outweighs the system's inability to see problems arise further out is probably dependent on the drivers level of alertness.

I've driven about 24,000 miles in the last year, 90% of which have been on autopilot. I've gotten to know the system well, and fully understand why some are afraid to use it.
 
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There are 2 answers, depending why you consider FSD:
  1. For the value of today's features? No.
  2. Because you love living in the future and seeing your car do new MAGIC every 2-4 weeks? And you check TeslaFi for updates waiting for new MAGIC? And you realize they literally just started tapping the power of the FSD chip in April and believe that the MAGIC will continue for years? And if you are ok if FSD is never 100% perfect and autonomous, realizing that the joy is in the journey? Then HELL YES.
#TeamMagic

Sorry, but for me the "Magic" isn't magical at all, it's frustrating.

Do I love updates with features that work fully? Yes. I love the updates. Love the games, love the real features like dash cam, etc. Fantastic.

Do I love features that don't work, work sporadically, work inconsistently from one instance to the next, and one car to the next? Hell no. I spend a lot of time in my car. 30k per year. That's at least 2 hours each work day if not more. These features should be golden to me. I AM the target audience.

Except that these features are supposed to make driving EASIER. Make my commute EASIER. TACC and AutoSteer do that. They really do reduce my stress level, especially the HW 3 version I am running now which is very smooth at speeding up and slowing down.

NOA which induces anxiety by slowing me down while an 18 wheeler climbs up my a@@ because it's braking for the ramp before it's time? Lane change on signal that takes forever to actually change, thereby missing the gap, or dives in and cuts off the crazy bastard in the bro-dozer zooming up behind me? Smart summon that swings wide and nearly clips all the curb islands in my parking lot? No, that doesn't reduce my stress level. That INCREASES my stress level. Perhaps where I live just has too much traffic. But the features I used on EAP were not at all ready for "prime time". j

So living in the future? Yeah, I'd love to live in the future. But the joy literally is NOT in the journey. It's in making the journey easier.

Am I afraid to use them? Nope. Someone like my wife would be. But I'll use them. But to use them consistently, there's only one reason to do so: make my life easier. I've had many years of 30k plus miles done commuting. I once blew through a 3 year, 36k mile warranty in 11 months. I've been in a position where I couldn't make my commute two days in a row and be able to refuel in my home state ($0.25 a gallon less) so I refueled EVERY DAY. Features for the sake of experimentation are cool, but not useful for reducing my fatigue level when spending 2 plus hours a day in the car.
 
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If you have EAP, stick with that. The only difference right now between EAP and FSD is stopping at stop lights. I have FSD upgraded from EAP when the price was cheap : $2k not $7k.I am upgraded to hw 3.0. It is getting better every update. The clinch for me is the car parking itself in parking lots. FSD on streets is... a while away.
I just upgraded from EAP to FSD for $4k. The $7K upgrade is for people that have basic AP (any M3 from the web site without FSD) and the $10K upgrade is for those that don't even have basic AP at all ($35k M3 SR RWD call-in order only).
 
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