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Continuing with my review of the options/features of my GL350. Today it's the special order option of Night View Assist Plus. It's an $1800 option.
For those that might not know what this is, it's an infrared camera that displays on your COMAND unit during nighttime driving. It was the one option I was the least sure of when ordering.
My intention/hope was it would help me identify deer in the ditches when I drive home at night. I live in a rural area and one deer collision avoided would pay for this feature.
My thought of how to use this was I'd see something suspicious ahead with my naked eye, then glance down to look at the display to get a better read of whether it's a person, deer, cat, possum, reflector, etc. The main issue I find is that the camera perspective is viewing ahead of what you are seeing naturally. This causes two issues for me. First I need a fraction of a second to adjust to being further ahead and find what I want to see, and by the time I have adjusted my view, the thing I wanted to look at closer has now left the field of view of the camera. Second, if I decided the best way to drive is to watch the display more rather than look out the window, since it's further ahead of your normal eye you get the same sensation as looking out of binoculars when in motion. It's a dizzy, headache generating sensation.
I've discarded it as an aid to night time driving, but was thinking it might be cool to use as essentially a poor man's night vision binoculars. Last night I came home and noticed eyes glowing in the field behind my house. It was completely dark. I thought to my self Night View Assist Plus might be a cool way to see the animals better. They were about 200 yards away, but the field of view was so small at that distance that it didn't really tell me much.
I've tried it a few times trying to get to like it, but I can't. It's cool to show to others, but in reality I find it pretty useless, in fact maybe even dangerous to use. Perhaps the target application is more for night time driving in city streets at lower speeds. But then I think your reaction time with the naked eye is just fine.
2013 GL450 (traded for 2015 Escalade), 2012 Corvette, 2014 Ford Fusion, Previous: 2007 GL450, 2011
Originally Posted by JimBarnhart
Continuing with my review of the options/features of my GL350. Today it's the special order option of Night View Assist Plus. It's an $1800 option.
For those that might not know what this is, it's an infrared camera that displays on your COMAND unit during nighttime driving. It was the one option I was the least sure of when ordering.
My intention/hope was it would help me identify deer in the ditches when I drive home at night. I live in a rural area and one deer collision avoided would pay for this feature.
My thought of how to use this was I'd see something suspicious ahead with my naked eye, then glance down to look at the display to get a better read of whether it's a person, deer, cat, possum, reflector, etc. The main issue I find is that the camera perspective is viewing ahead of what you are seeing naturally. This causes two issues for me. First I need a fraction of a second to adjust to being further ahead and find what I want to see, and by the time I have adjusted my view, the thing I wanted to look at closer has now left the field of view of the camera. Second, if I decided the best way to drive is to watch the display more rather than look out the window, since it's further ahead of your normal eye you get the same sensation as looking out of binoculars when in motion. It's a dizzy, headache generating sensation.
I've discarded it as an aid to night time driving, but was thinking it might be cool to use as essentially a poor man's night vision binoculars. Last night I came home and noticed eyes glowing in the field behind my house. It was completely dark. I thought to my self Night View Assist Plus might be a cool way to see the animals better. They were about 200 yards away, but the field of view was so small at that distance that it didn't really tell me much.
I've tried it a few times trying to get to like it, but I can't. It's cool to show to others, but in reality I find it pretty useless, in fact maybe even dangerous to use. Perhaps the target application is more for night time driving in city streets at lower speeds. But then I think your reaction time with the naked eye is just fine.
My recommendation is avoid this option.
Thanks Jim.... Had I remembered that it WAS an option I might have ordered it BUTTT did not....now I'm glad i didn't....appreciate the "up front" assessment!
First thing I thought when I first read about it was it would be a good poor visibility aid but if it doesn't even work then no use for it. Thanks for your time reviewing and posting your experiences.
First thing I thought when I first read about it was it would be a good poor visibility aid but if it doesn't even work then no use for it. Thanks for your time reviewing and posting your experiences.
Night Vision in my SL is Active, so it automatically comes on when it sees a pedestrian or bicyclist ahead. It's sometimes uncanny in such abilities, picking up on pedestrians hundreds of feet ahead that I would never have seen. In other cases, it fails to highlight the most obvious of hazards.
11-20-2012, 05:03 PM
