I'm curious what you buy when you purchase FSD. Are you buying a promise? What if Tesla can't provide FSD software in a reasonable amount of time. What happens to the money you spent up front. What if Tesla later decides it needs better hardware. Is Tesla obligated to upgrade your car to fulfill the promise you purchased?
This is what Full Self Driving buys you (from order page):
"This doubles the number of active cameras from four to eight, enabling full self-driving in almost all circumstances, at what we believe will be a probability of safety at least twice as good as the average human driver. The system is designed to be able to conduct short and long distance trips with no action required by the person in the driver’s seat. For Superchargers that have automatic charge connection enabled, you will not even need to plug in your vehicle.
All you will need to do is get in and tell your car where to go. If you don’t say anything, the car will look at your calendar and take you there as the assumed destination or just home if nothing is on the calendar. Your Tesla will figure out the optimal route, navigate urban streets (even without lane markings), manage complex intersections with traffic lights, stop signs and roundabouts, and handle densely packed freeways with cars moving at high speed. When you arrive at your destination, simply step out at the entrance and your car will enter park seek mode, automatically search for a spot and park itself. A tap on your phone summons it back to you.
Please note that Self-Driving functionality is dependent upon extensive software validation and regulatory approval, which may vary widely by jurisdiction. It is not possible to know exactly when each element of the functionality described above will be available, as this is highly dependent on local regulatory approval. Please note also that using a self-driving Tesla for car sharing and ride hailing for friends and family is fine, but doing so for revenue purposes will only be permissible on the Tesla Network, details of which will be released next year."
Order a Model S
Note that "in almost all circumstances" pretty much disqualifies it from SAE L5, but rather puts it at L4. L5 should be "all circumstances".
Although Elon had suggested elsewhere that Tesla will do computing hardware upgrades as necessary and Tesla PR said similar, they don't have a legal obligation to do so from the statement in the order page. There is also no timeline promised on when it will be activated.
References to HW upgrades (computing only, not sensor hardware; the statements are carefully worded to stress this):
“Tesla cars that are made today have the sensor system that is necessary for full autonomy, and we think probably enough computer power to be safer than a person,” Musk said. “So, mostly it’s just a question of uploading the software. And if it turns out that the computer power, that more computer power is needed, we can easily upgrade the computer.”
Elon Musk: Your Tesla May Need Computer Upgrade for Full Autonomy | Inverse
"However, we still expect to achieve full self-driving capability with safety more than twice as good as the average human driver without making any hardware changes to HW 2.0. If this does not turn out to be the case, which we think is highly unlikely, we will upgrade customers to the 2.5 computer at no cost"
Tesla has a new Autopilot ‘2.5’ hardware suite with more computing power for autonomous driving
The money you spent upfront can be used by Tesla for any purpose (although accounting-wise it is not counted as revenue until Tesla delivers the feature).
