Two weeks in and 800 miles later, here are some thoughts (Black LR, RWD, PUP, AutoPilot)
I am coming from a 2008 Acura TL
Pros:
Cons:
Overall, I bought the car for autopilot and witness the birth of FSD through software updates, and hoping for good performance. But I find myself enjoying the car mostly for its performance/driving dynamics, and barely using autopilot beside stop and go traffic.
I am coming from a 2008 Acura TL
Pros:
- Acceleration, it's really nice, as documented everywhere; quiet yet powerful acceleration at any speed without delay
- Regen braking; a bit of a learning curve, but once mastered the one pedal driving is great
- Autopilot when in stop and go traffic on the freeway. At 0-10mph, very little nagging and really a lot less tiring then driving in those conditions
- Black color looks great, don't hesitate to save the $$. Aero wheels look a ton better than on pictures. I was ready to remove the covers before getting the car but actually love the look in person. I already got a few compliments from strangers on the look of the car, from people that seemed to know nothing about Tesla, so purely based on car and wheels looks I think
- Glass roof: I curiously notice it more at night, when planes pass above, or glancing at stars...
- Software updates: it's great that the car improves (for the most part, see below) on a regular basis
Cons:
- FSD (which I paid for) is much further away than what I imagined from reading reviews, etc... even highway driving, the easiest use case to tackle by far, is far from perfect: hard braking in random places (shadows from bridges, etc...), hard time on strong curves, lanes merging issues, etc... It's doing good on the center lane of certain freeways though
- Autopilot nagging: they need to shift from monitoring steering resistance to use the onboard cameras to monitor drivers eyes; I find it easier to manually steer than having to prevent autopilot nagging, and this method of checking your attention seems unsafe
- Sound system: I don't get it; every review I see here and other forums mention how great the sound system is. Coming from the 2008 Acura TL, I find it to be inferior, the sounds feels tinier, phone calls/podcasts/etc don't sound too clear when on at freeway speeds, road noise is just too loud and audio system sound is too tiny. "Immersive" mode just turns on the sound on a couple of speakers but doesn't make it feel more immersive. I think the audio system is my biggest disappointment as I was expecting an upgrade from my previous car and feel like it is a downgrade.
- Frunk opens/close like a hood on an ICE car, which makes it not user friendly for daily use
- Air conditioning: not as comfortable as my previous car, as if it waits too much before kicking in. In my Acura TL, I had the temperature set to 72, and pretty much left it that way for 10 years. With this car, I set it to 71, which is fine 70% of the time, too hot 20% of the time, too cold 10% of the time; I feel I have to micromanage the AC more than I would like. I initially thought maybe this was a downside of the glass roof but this also happens at night. Maybe can be improved with software update...
- Removing charging cable in the morning requires unlocking the car first, should detect that the phone is around and unlock when pressing charger button, hopefully can be improved with software update
- Software updates fixes two issues but add two more, echo on phone calls seems to be fixed, the brake fluid warnings also seem gone, and homelink seem more reliable; but now the LTE connection comes and go since the last update, shifting in reverse show a black screen for a couple of seconds, etc... QA on these updates seem a bit light
Overall, I bought the car for autopilot and witness the birth of FSD through software updates, and hoping for good performance. But I find myself enjoying the car mostly for its performance/driving dynamics, and barely using autopilot beside stop and go traffic.