VW Brings Back Physical Buttons (caranddriver.com)
- Reference: 0180521877
- News link: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/26/01/06/0437256/vw-brings-back-physical-buttons
- Source link: https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a69916699/volkswagen-interior-physical-buttons-return/
> Volkswagen is making a drastic change to its interiors, or at least the interiors of its electric vehicles. The automaker recently unveiled a new cockpit generation with the refreshed ID. Polo -- the diminutive electric hatchback that the brand sells in Europe -- that [2]now comes with physical buttons . [...] The steering wheel gets new clusters of buttons for cruise control and interacting with music playback, while switches for the temperature and fan speed now live in a row along the dashboard.
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> The move back to buttons doesn't come out of nowhere. Volkswagen already started the shift with the new versions of the Golf and Tiguan models in the United States. Unfortunately, some climate controls, such as those for the rear defrost and the heated seats, are still accessed through the touchscreen. Thankfully, they look to retain their dedicated spot at the bottom of the display. Volkswagen hasn't announced which models will receive the new cockpit design. The redesigned interior also may be limited to the brand's electric vehicles, which would limit it to the upcoming refresh for the ID.4 SUV (and potentially the ID.Buzz), as the only VW EV models currently sold in America.
"Unfortunately, the glued-on-dash tablet look is still there," adds sinij.
[1] https://slashdot.org/~sinij
[2] https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a69916699/volkswagen-interior-physical-buttons-return/
It's still not a proper win (Score:5, Informative)
So many of the OEMs who are bringing back physical controls are doing really shitty implementations. This includes VW with its new Golf.
The main benefit of physical controls compared to touchscreen only, is that users can operate them without looking. But the new Polo, and my Mercedes EQA, have a strip of identical physical buttons, all little up/down levers with small icons. So you can try to use muscle memory to hit the correct button, but it's hard to press the correct one without looking. The contrast with my previous car, a Renault Zoe, could not be more striking. That car had three rotary controls for the AC, one to direct airflow where you wanted it to go, another to control the temperature, and another one for the fan speed. They were physically separated and after a couple of weeks, there was no chance that you'd use the fan control by mistake instead of the temperature control, for example. On top of that, rotary buttons are a much more intuitive and quick way to set a temperature or a fan speed than a little lever you have to click repeatedly.
The designers are absolutely prioritising form over function, all these years after Jobs's famous quote that design is how something works.
Re: (Score:2)
Three Dial air control is peak usability althought I'll also go with three levers. Drove many pre-80s cars with the three levers.
So the time every device wants to... (Score:1)
...be (like) a shiny iPhone is finally over?
Alternate reality (Score:2)
I like the way my Jeep works. It has both on screen and old school switches for most operations. Then I can decide on how I can operate.
The screen-only parts are for detailed things like oil temperature, individual tire pressure, lane monitoring, predicted miles between oil changes, and other things, which if I insisted on 100 percent manual would make the system as complicated as a B-29 cockpit. As well as make the thing cost over 150K
Even then, those are mostly steering wheel pushbutton controlled.
T
Losers (Score:5, Funny)
I want a fully AI car where the feature can never be turned off, the hood can't be opened, the screws all have one-way heads, and of course always-on 360 degree LED lights that outshine a galactic nucleus.
So I can leave it parked in my densified urban condo's underground storage while I work from home.
Masochist! (Score:3)
You forgot the ultimate theft insurance: A manual transmission!
Re: (Score:2)
You're in luck, Apple is reportedly looking at entering the auto market.
Now Microsoft et al should fix their #$% buttons (Score:2)
UI buttons used to be raised, so you could see quickly and easily what UI elements you could click on.
UI text entry fields used to be sunk, so you could see quickly and easily what UI elements you could type in.
Then UI artistes at Microsoft ( et al ), in an attempt to follow fashion, fucked it all up and made buttons you could click on into patches of color, which are indistinguishable from the patches of color which are not buttons and which you cannot click on.
And they gave up on indenting text entry fiel
Re: (Score:3)
Unironically get a toyota. They had the same wheel and AC control layout for a while, and it's hilariously intuitive with circles for D-pad on both sides of the wheel with "ok" button in the middle.
Let side controls the UI if the car, right side controls driving features (cruise control, LTA, etc).
Re: (Score:2)
Buttons was a deciding factor when I bought my Nissan Frontier.
Re: (Score:2)
100%.
Flat Design SUCKS because it turns every signal into noise where you can no longer easily tell what is:
a) interactable vs
b) static.
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Path of Exile 2 IMHO is a boring, tedious Ruthless Souls-lite grindfest.
Toyota be like (Score:3)
"You had a phase with no buttons? No wonder your resale values are shit".
Couldn't save pennies any more too many dead (Score:4, Interesting)
Saving some pennies (well more but whatever) on screen replacements for human-scale tactile controls killed too many people. Accidents and not being able to figure out how to turn the heat on in the winter. So now they're back to accepting the obvious gd dm truth that buttons and knobs that do one thing well in a single fixed mode work and cheap stupid $ss screens don't. Fn morons really didn't need lawsuits and 1000 page research papers to prove it. They just pretended to be stupid.
Remember the Tesla semis? (Score:2)
The ones stranded on the side of the road and needing to be towed because everything was controlled by the touch screen, then the touch screen failed?
Is it just me (Score:4, Interesting)
Or are there too many buttons in that image. I do support the physical controls but that steering wheel by my count has 19 buttons and that's without seeing if there are more on the backside of the wheel. There's gotta be a reasonable middle ground between no button Tesla and 1980's button madness.
Re: (Score:2)
> There's gotta be a reasonable middle ground between no button Tesla and 1980's button madness.
We had that. it was from roughly 1993-2013, before the first Federally-imposed intrusion of the screen into our cars.
Truly, the last gasp of the car, before it turned into a laptop-driven living room surrounded by Brutalist architecture.
Re: (Score:2)
The inclusion of a screen and backup camera is good, there's been a marked reduction in injuries via backing up, particularly with children. That didn't lead to the touch madness we have now, in fact I would attribute that to a lack of regulation in the US, only now is the EU once again setting the tone by enforcing physical controls again.
No the blame for what you're talking about falls on us and the automakers for being trend chasers. In a better world Tesla is not allowed to ship the Model 3 with its m
Re: (Score:2)
> The inclusion of a screen and backup camera is good, there's been a marked reduction in injuries via backing up, particularly with children
Partly disagree. That first screen was the nose under the camel's tent. It was soon co-opted for car config, then nav, then infotainment, and now has grown to a laptop.
The injuries and accidents of people backing into kids are easily solved by a walkaround of the car before you get in. Takes 10 seconds. Any flats? Any oil slicks? Any coolant puddles? Any cats / kids / dogs / trikes / whatnots behidn the car? No? In we go, belt on, engine start, putter away. Do this every time.
A 15 second walk aroun
History will show... (Score:2)
... that an automobile user interface that requires you to look away from the road every time you use it was a BAD IDEA. My steering wheel physical buttons are still imperfect, as in there are too many of them so sometimes I push the wrong one or push one accidentally, but at least I don't have an accident while using them.
Touch screens are driver abuse. (Score:4, Insightful)
Way too much attention is needed to use them while moving, at some point I hope they require the touch screen to be locked out from use when a car is in motion. Distracted driving is illegal in most states, touch screen have to be arguably one of the biggest distractions and it is included with every car.
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Screens can be made cool, just almost nobody does that. One of my cars has a set of round dials for temperature control with digital screen inside the round dial to display temperature setting. That is cool.
Car music playback (Score:2)
Seems every car maker these days thinks we all listen to music on fecking spotify via our phones. No, we don't. Some of us listen on the old steam radio (often buried away in sub menus with changing stations a needlessly complicated task) and have large numbers of CDs we'd like to play but apparently thats old hat now with CD drives not even being a purchase option with any manufacturer.
Yeah, maybe I am old and maybe you should get off my lawn, but not everything new is better and easier to use.
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> Seems every car maker these days thinks we all listen to music on fecking spotify via our phones. No, we don't. Some of us listen on the old steam radio (often buried away in sub menus with changing stations a needlessly complicated task) and have large numbers of CDs we'd like to play but apparently thats old hat now with CD drives not even being a purchase option with any manufacturer.
> Yeah, maybe I am old and maybe you should get off my lawn, but not everything new is better and easier to use.
I losslessly ripped all my CDs to a USB thumb drive and use that in the car. One can still combine old school with elements of modernity. It's way more convenient than dealing with discs.
Re: Car music playback (Score:2)
Tried a thumb drive in my car, didnt recognise that either.
no horses in the barn (Score:2)
Sorry, too late. VW has awful reliability ratings. Any Japanese car is better than a VW, unless maybe you want a Porsche.
Re: no horses in the barn (Score:2)
Yep. My newest car is a Subaru, complete with buttons and a manual transmission and much higher reliability ratings.
Dupe? (Score:2)
VW is publishing dupes now? I thought they announced this news last year. Or is this just a case of them following through on a promise?
I'll buy ID.Polo (and Cupra Raval / Skoda Epiq) (Score:2)
....unless they totally screw something up.
It's basically something I have been waiting for since EVs became a thing and these specifically when they were first announced. They have been delayed by couple of years from the original projected release, but the thing is, nothing better seems to be in the pipeline from any vendor.
The 450 km range and price somewhere between 25k to 30k (euros) - unless they have totally screwed something up, Shut Up and Take My Money. All the others cost more than
Re: (Score:2)
I just read on that car because it's not available in my region. According to Wikipedia, it will have either a 38 or 56 kWh battery. The 38 kWh battery likely won't have that 450 km range. This is most likely with the large battery, and even then, they must be using the very optimistic WLTP test cycle to get those numbers. I expect more like 300 km real-world range in ideal summer conditions.
Yay.. (Score:5, Insightful)
It's possible now, I might consider a VW if I was buying a new car, since physical buttons are a requirement for me. Touchscreens in cars a fucking terrible safety hazard and poor user experience.
I literally bought a 2011 BMW because it has real dials (not LCD) and actual buttons.
I also have a tesla, and other than the performance, everything else about the car sucks. It's objectively just poorly designed. Even the touch screen ignoring the non-physical button aspect, the design is atrocious. There are UI elements that are 5mm wide that you have to touch while traveling 70mph.
Don't even start on the absolutely POINTLESS and waste of space the 3d picture of the car is.
Why can't my passenger adjust radio without covering my sat nav ? Why is the text so small ?
Anyway good for VW. Hope more manufacturers follow.
Re:Yay.. (Score:5, Interesting)
I am happy that a brand this large is reconsidering... but it's still VW...
I wouldn't touch a German car with a ten foot pole. Right now my dream car is a 2016 Toyota Sienna... used prices are just nuts at the moment...
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I just bought a used 2021 Hyundai Kona EV, low mileage, for a great price (US$22K). The major factor in the choice was it has nearly all physical buttons and rotary controls.
Very happy so far, range in the city is about 500km (300Miles) and long term average consumption is 11.8kwh/100km (6miles per kwh). Battery at 50,00km has no detectable deterioration.
Being retired, nearly all of my trips are no more than 4-5 miles, a use case modern ICE engines do not like at all.
Still got a turbo MX5 for fun drives!
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My sister has an EV6 and nothing but good to say about it.
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> My sister has an EV6 and nothing but good to say about it.
I know a muscle car nut who has hardly driven his prized Grand National since buying EV6 GT in 2023 and it's been his FB backdrop photo since
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Your dream car is an ugly people mover? I get that it might be super practical and fill all your needs but dream car? C'mon.
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Some people have dreams of the vehicle being reliable. No German car has fit that description since the nineties.
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Exactly. A car is a tool. And since I don't want to own more than one of those, I ned a very versatile piece of kit.
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I don't even blame Tesla too much for going for minimalism in its initial design, since that was the epitome of futuristic at the time, and Tesla was still pretty busy just managing to pull together enough various pieces and parts to build an entire vehicle. But things have moved on and in a lot of ways it seems like they aren't leading the charge any more, or perhaps even keeping up, and in 2026 it is accepted that a luxurious modern interior is not just the biggest possible touch screen attached (and not
Re: (Score:2)
Dieselgate really hurt their reputation, and other missteps... To recover they have to do something very different from the other manufacturers to differentiate themselves from the pack. Building what people actually want to buy instead of what they want to sell would do it!
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Most Mazda models have tactile controls. We've got 3 of them and the no-touch display is my favorite feature. They also have a very reliable drive train.