company car - Mercedes C, Jag xf R, Bmw 4
- Thread starter adamau5
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Stuck on iPad looks stupid if its permanent. I think the old A8 had a better system where the screen popped up and then was stowed away when off. I do think that we will return to mid-dash screens for infotainment with nav provided from cluster a la TT.
Soldato
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TT is just the continuation but with additional map detail of the MY11 Range Rover and the XJ full 12.3" TFT instrument cluster design.
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Soldato
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Even the Mondeo has a screen in the instrument cluster to give you directions or to browse through your music complementing the mid-dash screen. The new TT instrument cluster is hardly revolutionary...
My vote would be the BMW 5 series.
My vote would be the BMW 5 series.
The new A3 has the same system, and a button to lower the screen should you decide you don't need it up. It really is great.
Soldato
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We're talking about the interface where the TFT is THE instrument cluster.
The Mondeo just has a slightly larger colour version of the little crappy menu screens that everything has had forever though, the TT has the entire cluster as a TFT with resizeable dials, mode specific layouts etc. which I would suggest is a fairly decent step on from the basic menu screen.
Soldato
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I realise but my point is that it's not that revolutionary, it's where most car manufacturers were going anyway, it's more of an evolutionary step. My personal preference would be to still have a screen on the dashboard and another in the instrument cluster rather than either one or the other. It means the passenger can interact with the system.
I suppose it depends where you're going to draw the line between revolution and evolution because if you're going to call moving from a dash screen to a cluster screen evolution, then something like the F10 would register as 'totally stagnant' as it's barely changed in fundamental layout since the E39 
![[TW]Fox](/data/man-of-honor/2009.png){kind=avatar}
Why does everyone think the TT is the first to do this? It's not - quite a lot of other cars have TFT displays for the instrument cluster including, would you believe it, the '1990's' BMW F10 5 Series.
The TT is just the first one to show it in a television advert.
something like the F10 would register as 'totally stagnant' as it's barely changed in fundamental layout since the E39
Why change something that works? BMW tried that with the E60 and the interior was the worst part of the car. The F10 feels like a 15 year newer interpretation of the E39 which is why so many E39 lovers are so happy with the F10. Everything is in the right place, everything is properly integrated, it looks and feels like a modern interpretation of classic BMW ergonomics. I absolutely love the interior in the F10, it's one of my favourite features of the entire car.
I know I'm going to have to get used to the stupid tablet fad but it is exactly that - a stupid fad. Everyone is doing it now, which is why it looks 'modern' (if everyone decided to ship brand new cars with a selection of fruit on the dashboard then that too would be 'modern' because it'd be a feature found in modern cars), but I don't get why? What is wrong with integrated interior design that flows properly? The interior of the C Class is wonderful - then the screen ruins it.
It's just to obviously cliche - 'oh look, tablet computing is the latest trendy cool thing, lets get down with the kids and make the dashboard of our newest models look like somebody nailed a tablet to it'. The only interior it works in Merc wise is the G-Wagen because in the G-Wagen it is exactly what it looks like - an afterthought, a way to add nav to an interior designed 25 years ago when nav didn't exist
Merc have been going through an interior bad patch since the previous C Class came out in 2007 with a dash lifted straight from the Vauxhall design school. It's all the more annoying because the early 2000's Merc interiors were the complete opposite - absolutely class leading. Look at a 2003 E Class or a 2003 SL and compare it to the competition around at the time and Mercedes interiors were just absolutely excellent. Then they went all utilitarian and cheap looking and now they've gone all 'ipad'. Thankfully they've resisted ruining the S Class but how many of us can really afford one of those?
Look at the interior of Merc's flagship - the £130,000 S Class Coupe:
http://image.motortrend.com/f/roadt...ercedes-benz-s-class-coupe-interior-cabin.jpg
No stupid tablet there...
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Did I say the TT is the first to do it? No. Does the F10 screen completely rearrage itself depending on what you're doing? No. You know perfectly well the point i'm making, no need to resort to the pedanticism just yet, especially as nothing i've said is even directly disagreeing with you.
I agree the F10 interior is nice and you'll note that my earlier post specifically said I don't like the tablet style direction, so quite why you launched that particular little wall of text at me I don't know
Personally I would call the F10 interior an evolution from the preceding models but I would class the change the TT made as something a bit more significant, i.e revolution. The only point I made was that if you're going to lump that in as a small evolution too, I don't know what you'd really call a revolution in the interior workings of a car and something like the F10 must surely register as having not changed at all in comparison. That doesn't mean I think it's a bad interior.
I agree the F10 interior is nice and you'll note that my earlier post specifically said I don't like the tablet style direction, so quite why you launched that particular little wall of text at me I don't know
Personally I would call the F10 interior an evolution from the preceding models but I would class the change the TT made as something a bit more significant, i.e revolution. The only point I made was that if you're going to lump that in as a small evolution too, I don't know what you'd really call a revolution in the interior workings of a car and something like the F10 must surely register as having not changed at all in comparison. That doesn't mean I think it's a bad interior.
It does if you spec the Multifunction display - it is a TFT panel not a conventional fixed instrument cluster.
The 'unique' thing about the TT is that all of the nav functionality is in the instrument cluster rather than on a separate screen - other cars (including other Audi's before the TT) have some of the nav functionality in the instrument cluster and rest in a proper display. Which is surely a better solution - how does your front seat passenger access any of the functionality of the infotainment or navigation system in the TT? They don't is the answer to that.
If you think an interior that looks very very similar to the TT before it but has nav stuff in the instrument cluster is a 'revolution' than perhaps we have different levels of expectation
I agree the F10 interior is nice and you'll note that my earlier post specifically said I don't like the tablet style direction, so quite why you launched that particular little wall of text at me I don't know
It's not aimed at you, you just gave me the opportunity to say it
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Well in terms of it just being a screen movement it's not huge but the idea of completely moving the entire infotainment interaction to the cluster instead of on the dash is a fairly big leap in terms of interaction with the car I think and certainly more revolutionary than anything else happening in the car interior world at the moment.
I don't think the F11 I experienced had the multifunction display but I don't think it does much to utilise the nature of being a screen beyond changing colours etc. does it? It certainly doesn't resize dials, rearrange the layout etc. depending on whether you're using nav, radio or whatever else as far as I know.
I don't see what else is happening that people would call revolutionary and relegate that to the same league as 'simply' taking a conventional layout and making it a bit nicer than it was before
edit - as for front seat passengers being able to interact with it, I bloody hate passengers prodding away at things, changing settings etc. on my car while i'm driving, the less access they have the better
I don't think the F11 I experienced had the multifunction display but I don't think it does much to utilise the nature of being a screen beyond changing colours etc. does it? It certainly doesn't resize dials, rearrange the layout etc. depending on whether you're using nav, radio or whatever else as far as I know.
I don't see what else is happening that people would call revolutionary and relegate that to the same league as 'simply' taking a conventional layout and making it a bit nicer than it was before
edit - as for front seat passengers being able to interact with it, I bloody hate passengers prodding away at things, changing settings etc. on my car while i'm driving, the less access they have the better
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This is the multifunction dash F10/11/12/13
What I've not shown in that video is the satnav information that appears for directions, junctions, motorway lanes etc. But then to be honest I've got the HUD and that trumps pretty much everything the dash can display.
What I've not shown in that video is the satnav information that appears for directions, junctions, motorway lanes etc. But then to be honest I've got the HUD and that trumps pretty much everything the dash can display.
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I think the Merc S Class is more revolutionary than the Audi TT and a better implantation of TFT displays, too. The TT just moves stuff, stuff you might not actually have wanted moving in the first place.
