Volkswagen charges a subscription for full engine power

The manufacturers can generally save by making one set of seats or one type of electronics rather than two or three different types. In many cases you're paying hundreds of pounds for a button on the dash or simple activation on the ECU and the option then appears on the screen.

Brb, downloading some leather seats and a sunroof :p
 
Like it or not subscription services are here to stay as it's another way to guarantee income, how long has MS Office, Acrobat and other software packages been available via subscriptions rather than one off purchase, it's just taken the car manufacturers a while to work out how to incorporate it, if you don't like it don't subscribe.

The state of software is why early push back matters.

PS you can still get Office as a one off purchase. It's also WAY cheaper.
 
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they turn a standard chip manufacturing reduncancy technique into a marketting gimmick - with the parts that were binned with failed cores sold for servers

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everyone has an engine ecu map update strategy until their engine fails
electronics are cheap (a part from teslas cpu for future-proofing 'fsd') but hardware less so, like bmw you don't overengineer.

Today there are 3 versions of this cylinder: UL, OL and TOP.

  • UL stands for lower-performance, the piston is made out of a simple aluminum-alloy, the crankshaft is simple-forged and uses a sintered connecting rod. It can cover up to 25kw/75nm per cylinder and is used in models like the x16d, x18d and x25d (exept the f10 model after 2011)
  • OL stands for upper-perfomance, the cylinder path is honed several times, it has forged connecting rods and the bearings of the rods and crankshaft are sputtered bearing. It can cover up to 35kw/100nm and is used in models like x20d, x30d.
  • TOP is for high performance, including a special treated crankshaft as well as laser-treated cylinder-paths. With this it is possible to increase injection-pressure and rated speed. This cylinders are used in models like x23d, 525d (after 2011) and x35d/x40d.
 
That's not the same as remapping though. I could do that in my Seat but no one had worked out how to crack the ECU to actually remap it.
Indeed. That’s just coding. Wow my headlight washers come on after 7 not 5 squirts. That’s not a power upgrade
 
they turn a standard chip manufacturing reduncancy technique into a marketting gimmick - with the parts that were binned with failed cores sold for servers

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everyone has an engine ecu map update strategy until their engine fails
electronics are cheap (a part from teslas cpu for future-proofing 'fsd') but hardware less so, like bmw you don't overengineer.

Completely different. CPU chips are graded depending on defects. Engines are built different and use different parts
 
The state of software is why early push back matters.

PS you can still get Office as a one off purchase. It's also WAY cheaper.
Don't think it's going anywhere, people will always use it that's why companies that charge 99.9% interest are still around, a lot of people look at the cost per month\week rather than overall cost.

Also I know you can still get Office as a one-off payment, this I think is a good thing on the 2nd hand market, say you're after a certain specc'd car but cannot find it with say heated seats and steering wheel or adaptive cruise etc. just buy a car and then add them via the subscription.

The only things are physical upgrades like leather seats or sunroof but they would never form part of this business model anyhow
 
Another thing people aren't thinking about is Higher Value Car Tax, what happens if you spec a car with all the extra's and it takes it over the £40k threshold (I know laughable how low the threshold is to be classed as a luxury car), remove all the available add-ons at purchase point and then add them via subscription at a later date, bingo an extra £500 a year saved
 
Do you think there's any risk - as we have seen with PC software - of manufacturers ending support for a car? And what issues might that cause?
That's a good question, could you imagine there you are ploughing down the M1 in the outside lane at 70mph (so the pedantic brigade don't bring speeding into this) and you're car is 'bricked' by Audi as it's a no longer supported model :cry:
 
Do you think there's any risk - as we have seen with PC software - of manufacturers ending support for a car? And what issues might that cause?
Already sort of happens on my old Hyundai i20 the subscription to the online mapping etc ran out after 7(?) years and it no longer used a supported network so there was no option to resubscribe. The really annoying thing was it meant you got a popup telling you this every time you got in the car with no way to permanently hide it.
 
Already sort of happens on my old Hyundai i20 the subscription to the online mapping etc ran out after 7(?) years and it no longer used a supported network so there was no option to resubscribe. The really annoying thing was it meant you got a popup telling you this every time you got in the car with no way to permanently hide it.

And no way to simply change the unit for something new as it's probably not a din fitting lol
 
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Moving to intricately integrated stereos instead of standard DIN fittings is probably one of the meaner jokes car manufacturers have played on us all in the name of 'improvements'.

Possibly being slightly mitigated these days by the standardisation of Carplay/Android Auto.

It's weird to see that places like Halfords still have a wall of car stereos. Surely there's few cars younger than 20 years old that they'd even fit in?
 
Moving to intricately integrated stereos instead of standard DIN fittings is probably one of the meaner jokes car manufacturers have played on us all in the name of 'improvements'.

Possibly being slightly mitigated these days by the standardisation of Carplay/Android Auto.

It's weird to see that places like Halfords still have a wall of car stereos. Surely there's few cars younger than 20 years old that they'd even fit in?

There are 10 year old cars which still take a standard double din stereo, albeit with a fascia plate rather than just a straight swap out; I fitted an android auto one in my partner's 2015 Swift a few months ago, can't imagine that's the only one either.

A few years more recent than that though, and you're probably right!
 
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With the built in obsolesce of an integrated unit...

Ironically having an old school din fitting is actually more future proof.

A modern car "infotainment" is like buying a PC you can never upgrade. Then one day it's just not going to turn on and youll have to spend 1000s on old, obsolete parts to fix it. Even more annoying when the AC controls are on it
 
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The state of software is why early push back matters.

PS you can still get Office as a one off purchase. It's also WAY cheaper.
Not a good comparison.
With a Subscription to Office you're always entitled to the latest version. If you keep on buying the latest version each time, there is virtually no saving.
If you only buy once and don't mind running an 8yr old piece of software then subscription was never aimed at you.
Subscription Office also comes with extras such as Cloud Storage - something you don't get with the one-off purchase. Again, if cloud storage for your files is of no interest then fine, but if you were planning any kind of resilience or copy of your files somewhere other than your local machine - those costs need to be factored in.
 
With a Subscription to Office you're always entitled to the latest version. If you keep on buying the latest version each time, there is virtually no saving.

The cost of Office is about 2 months subscription. It's not hard at all to run the latest version.
 
It might have already been mentioned, but I was having a browse through the infotainment on my ŠKODA elroq in the shop section, turns out I can pay £250 to enable high beam assist lol
 
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