I just put about 1,000 miles on my “Dead Car Driving” S580, driving it from our home in Orange County, up to Carmel. The car drove great at highway speeds, very quiet and smooth. I did notice a couple of things:

1. The Distronic Plus does not work as smoothly as it did in my previous MB’s, when reacting to a slowing vehicle ahead of me. It tends to brake later and more harshly. And after braking a bit late, there seems to be more of a lag, before it accelerates to the set speed again. The systems in my three W222’s definitely worked in what felt like a more smooth and balanced manner.

2. The “Set” button for the Distronic Plus seems to be wearing out or something. I experienced several incidents when I pressed the button fully, but it took two or three attempts before it actually worked.

3. As I have mentioned many times before, the steering wheel controls on the W223 are, in my opinion, not nearly as precise, simple, or as intuitive to operate as the controls on virtually every other MB I’ve had, at least since 2014 or so. The steering wheels in the 2017 & later W222’s (photo) were virtual “works of art,” in my opinion and the W223 units fail miserably in comparison. MB has started using these haptic equipped steering wheels in most of their vehicles now and I feel that is such a shame. They replaced the beautiful, elegant, brushed metal surface with the cheap looking, black plastic that always looks dusty. The did away with the virtually perfectly intuitive physical controls with these crummy haptic things. Can anyone truthfully say this was done for any reason other than cost cutting?

 

The answer is here (link below). Not only that capacitive touch buttons themselves are cheaper than physical ones, but also they save on the integrated circuit and driver built, in a way that a single driver built can now support even up to 5+ capacitive buttons. Sometimes even more, according to the document, the MSP430FR2633 (see page 9) can drive 64 buttons and costs less than $1.5!!!!!!.
https://www.ti.com/lit/an/slaa842b/slaa842b.pdf

 

If a manufacturer can make something that costs less, but is as good or better than a more expensive design, I think we would all welcome such an advancement. However, when the less expensive item performs poorly, is not robust, long lasting and is not attractive, then I think we need to voice our displeasure to said manufacturer.

 

Capacitive buttons have fewer issues which reduces profit sapping warranty claims. They're also less expensive to manufacturer and the savings are not passed on to consumers because no boy wonder every got ahead without finding a way to improve the bottom line.

It's no secret as to why they want to sell them to us and it isn't because they're stupid. To me it's interesting to note that they couldn't possibly have not known that the user experience is significantly degraded but they did it anyways. It tells you something about what they think of us.

 

I agree, but I would have hoped that at least they would avoid using it on the S-class line. I get the idea of integrating it in the A-to-E class vehicles, but they should have remained on the same promise that the S-class is treated differently, in a way that user-experience as well as premium product choices are number one priority over cost savings. Even if such design choice would add a couple 100s to the vehicle MSRP, the average S-class user would have preferred to see that in the S-class. That's how it worked historically, but currently and obviously the S-class is slowly becoming just a large C or E class vehicle. Same screen, same steering wheel, same operating system and nearly same components to some degree.

 

The S class is now just another commodity to MB. Churn profits and continue to dilute the brand. Sit in any MB and everything is shared even with the A class.

Servicing is the same…first come first serve whether it’s an A class or an SL AMG.

 

The car industry has started to admit that capacitive buttons and touchscreens were a big mistake. It has led to significant drops in customer satisfaction. Who knew, right? VW was the first manufacturer saying that they are getting rid of the capacitive buttons and reduce reliance on touchscreens by adding physical buttons back for commonly used functions in future models. VW in particular has seen something like near 50% drop in customer satisfaction due to the capacitive buttons and touchscreens. It's been going around in the news lately. There's hope that this insanity will get corrected as the reality is catching up with them.

I've always said touch interfaces in cars are stupid. I still stand behind it. Had now three loaners in the last 6 months with the capacitive buttons and the gigantic touchscreen. A S 500 and a new C 300 twice. Absolutely terrible to operate these cars. I can't emphasize it enough. It didn't help that in the C300 everything was buggy. I didn't even bother with MBUX itself and used CarPlay to have a familiar interface, but wireless CarPlay kept crashing and disconnecting. Switched to wired CarPlay which was more stable, but occasionally failed as well. Just kinda unbelievable how half-backed these cars are. The distraction factor was huge. Every little adjustment takes concentration. Simple things like adjusting the volume in increments is nearly impossible. You have to swipe the volume control on the steering wheel, so the result is either too low or too high. The volume control over by the touchscreen at least has +/- you can press, but you have to reach over. Somebody has to tell me what was wrong with the volume scroll wheel on the steering wheel before. That was the perfect physical control for adjusting the volume.

 

If you want a premium product and premium service you have to go upmarket. MB and BMW sell some 2mm plus cars per year with a very low $ entry point Ala A class.

Porsche sells some 300,000 plus cars per year with a higher entry point Ala Macan.

Lamborghini, Ferrari etc sell some 10,000 cars per year with very high points of entry (Urus, Roma).

Im just trying to illustrate how the traditional “high end brands” MB, BMW, what I grew up thinking of as the “IT” brands have changed and become high volume, low entry cost brands.

Buying an S class now is the equivalent in Real Estate of buying the most expensive home on your street.

People are looking for exclusivity hence the success of the Super SUV’s (amongst other reasons such as demographic, comfort, combining super car performance with daily drive ability and luxury). The Chairman of Aston Martin recently said that entry into the brand will start at the $200,000 mark. So todays Vantage would not qualify. They are moving even further upmarket.

People are willing for exclusivity and all that goes with it (service, quality, status etc).

 

I don't quite agree with that. These higher end low volume brands don't have the money to develop everything, so they buy stuff from other brands. Particularly the cabin tech. Porsche uses the same MIB3 Infotainment system as the rest of VW. The Infotainment system and switch gear in a Bentley looks like it came straight out of an Audi. The Urus looks like an Audi RSQ8 with typical Lambo design elements, but it is essentially an RSQ8, because Lambo couldn't afford to develop an SUV from the ground up. Aston Martins use an old MB COMAND system, but have now also gotten blowback for it and the new DB12 now has a new Infotainment system and finally an interior that's worthy of a car like that.

 

correct and Tesla is using gear selector from MB and so on.
So the tech on those cars are no better and often worse than on MB or BMW.
I disagree about MBUX though, you can create a memory button and assign virtually all functions you'd need, then you either press star on a steering wheel or on MBUX to get there. Those buttons are huge and easy to navigate around
The touch controls could be improved as I accidently select the wrong thing sometimes, but still, searching for the small physical buttons is not much better.
Perhaps I am around tech too much but I have no issues with touch controls, they are everywhere nowadays including airplanes that look MBUX times 5.

 

You are absolutely right….economies of scale. I actually like that the smaller niche brands like Lamborghini have access to the VW group as the cars are more thoroughly researched hence leading to a better product.

The question becomes is it worth it to the consumer to buy the more expensive product from the “premium “ make? Pretty well Every premium manufacturer now has this cross sharing:

Bentley:vw
Ferrari:fiat/Maserati/alfa
Lamborghini:Vw
porsche:vw
Aston:Mercedes’ amg
rolls Royce:BMW

I can buy an Audi Q5 or a Porsche Macan at a significant premium to the Audi(basically the same car). How much is being part of the Porsche family worth it to me?

I remember when I was young GM cross sharing everything between Olds Delta 88/98, Buick Lesabre/Park Avenue/ Cadillac/Deville/Fleetwood. All essentially the same cars underneath but significant price differences.

 

I'm around tech all the time, too. I'm a software developer myself and my wife does web design and UX. Just because touchscreens are everywhere doesn't mean they suit all use cases. When you operate the entertainment system on an airplane you are not also flying the airplane at the same time. Touchscreens make a lot of sense on smartphones or other personal devices where you can pay full attention to it and do relatively quick and simple tasks, but if you are doing multiple things at the same time and need to be also productive, then they are a bad fit. For example I use a Surface Book 3 for work and personal use. I rarely use the touch interface. I mostly have it connected to an external ultra wide screen monitor with BT keyboard and mouse, because I actually need to be productive. Trying to work on the device itself with a smaller screen and using the touchpad or touchscreen is ok for simple tasks while traveling, but not if I actually need to get something done.

You can workaround with shortcuts/favorites to a degree, but it's still not better than direct physical buttons. You have to press the favorites button first, then look for and press the actual function button that you need. I operate most of the physical buttons in my 2019 AMG blind. I can change the drive mode directly from the steering wheel with a rotary knob that I don't need to look at. Pretty much everything is within reach of my thumb and can be operated blindly w/o even taking my hands off the steering wheel. For the lesser used functions I have to reach down to the center console, but even there I have dedicated physical buttons that I can find w/o looking, and I can rest or support my arm/hand on something while operating the functions instead of my arm floating in the air.

Using a touchscreen while driving is like playing Whac-A-Mole, especially in a sportier AMG with firmer suspension. It works ok in an S Class, because one is fairly disconnected from the road, but try operating a the touchscreen in an AMG while driving on a bumpy road. It quickly becomes very frustrating and futile.

 

I wasn't talking about entertainment system on airplane, I was talking about controls used to fly it. I looked recently inside the newest business jet, it had 5 huge screens and few physical buttons.
In any case, I am fine with MB tech overall and now that they added AI chat, it's even easier to do things.
It's a moot point as I doubt they'd go back in time; if anything, it'd be moving towards voice and gesture interface using AI.
Nobody is writing code for legacy systems.

 

I don't wanna imply that flying a plane is simple, but they do most of the inputting while stationary on the ground, and once in the air you don't have to worry about traffic lights, other planes crossing in front of you or changing "lanes" into you etc. There is also a copilot and a pilot who operate and fly the plane together, plus a fairly sophisticated autopilot. We are far from an equivalent autopilot in cars for example, because we have pedestrians, bicycles and dumb drivers to deal with on the road. All airplanes are flown by highly qualified people and not grandmas etc. and people texting while driving.

As for voice control, while again useful for complex tasks that would require pressing a bunch of buttons as well as inputting text it makes a lot of sense, but for simple functions using voice control takes like 10 times as long. Also try talking to your car while your passengers are having a conversation. I know they've gotten better by placing microphones above each seat in the S Class to try to determine who is talking, but it's still rather awkward if you are talking to your car while others in your car are having a discussion and gestures are limited. Changing volume with gesture control in BMWs for example looks rather dumb if you are seen doing it. How many YouTube videos have you seen where Hey Mercedes is inadvertently responding when the driver said something that sounds similar to Hey Mercedes? We are still very far from having natural conversations with machines.

My main issue with all this is that we've developed new fancy UIs and then discovered that they are more involved and cumbersome to use, so we have come up with workarounds to make it work somehow. Why? For example we came up with swiping keyboards, because otherwise typing on a screen is rather dumb. So we replaced physical keyboards that were working beautifully with virtual keyboards and then had to come up with an entirely new way of typing, because the virtual keyboards sucked. Even though I'm in tech, I've become quite cynical about modern tech.

 

Technology has always brought new problems with it. Moving from a physical keyboard meant new ways to interact with a virtual keyboard were certain to come along; It was guaranteed. You probably recall there used to be keyboard competitions for entering text; that went away when Swype came along and the top ten were all swiping on virtual keyboards. That was when I understood it was time to think about moving away from my Blackberry. Looking back on it now I use Gboard's swipe function and enter text more easily and quickly than I ever did with a physical keyboard. I had to learn something new but the world didn't end.

Across my life that's how tech has worked: When it came along things needed to get sorted out, and that did happen in time.

 

That is absolutely true and I don't disagree with that. I didn't make a career in technology for nothing. It's just that increasingly things are changed for the sake of change. The saying "don't fix it if it ain't broken" is a good mantra that more engineers should take to heart. There are definitely good things that came out of technology, but also a lot of technology was promised as the next big thing, but disappeared as quickly as it came, because it was actually crap. One of the common complaints that VW customers and other car customers have is that things get moved around and changed with every generation for no good reason when the way it was operated before was working perfectly fine. The constantly move the cheese as we say.

You can't tell me that the capacitive controls are better than physical buttons. No matter what. They are worse to operate than the physical buttons before them and nothing is gonna change that. Capacitive is a fundamental issue. For example I tend to have dry skin and the capacitive buttons often don't react, because my skin is not conductive enough. So these are new input methods that come with disadvantages that the previous methods simply didn't have.

 

No, I would never say that: I'm tangentially in the controls business, although I farm it, and I have quite a bit of data about how people interact with them. Some things are obvious; a control that makes something go up and down should always have up, actuated by moving up, and down, by moving down. This isn't just Captain Obvious stuff; in an emergency when people operating these controls need to go down they have a strong inclination to push down to make that happen and if the control is set up in the opposite it can lead to unfortunate consequences. This is so well known that setting them up in the opposite will invite liability in any accident involving that control. It doesn't stop there. If the control must be pushed or pulled most people will want to pull for up and push for down; again setting them up in the opposite will be asking for trouble because in an emergency when someone wants to lower something they are very likely to push that control, not a good thing if the goal was to raise a heavy object off some poor soul that has their leg pinned under a heavy object. I could bore the crap out of you here but you get the idea. There is a reason why controls are set up the way you find them. Unfortunately, one major reason is money.

Screens are increasing in cockpits for several reasons. It reduces information density, making them easier to parse at a glance. They're cheaper and easier to change to newer components because only the monitor need be mounted in the cockpit, the "black box" can be mounted remotely where they're easier to service and access. Most of the flight controls, the things used to actually maneuver the aircraft, are on physical controls.

In your car I think you'd be surprised by how much you look at the controls, physical or not. Most people only use the major controls without looking: Steering wheel, throttle, brakes, turn signal, etc. Even things as small as turning a volume knob on a center stack usually involve at least a glance by most people. What I know says most people would be best served by getting the major functions on physical controls but the lesser functions would make little difference. An accident trying to parse out which button among many will actuate some random lesser used function isn't much different from an accident finding the right spot to press on a screen for that same function.

 

Yes, screens are great for secondary functions, but the primary functions should be on physical controls. I can't speak for other people, but I do use the buttons I use frequently w/o looking. I do have to glance at those that I only use occasionally, but that's kinda obvious. The ones I operate frequently such as the DISTRONIC buttons, volume control on the steering wheel, touchpads to operate the digital instrument cluster and Infotainment, the AMG Drive Unit controls to switch the drive mode and related settings I use completely w/o looking. I have memorized them and developed the necessary muscle memory.

 

I don't disagree at all; even though people usually do look at most controls when they interact with them, it's a shorter look for a knob versus finding the sweet spot on a screen. I would however say if you film yourself driving, you may find you're looking at the controls more than you think. Most people will say they don't look at that volume knob if you ask them, but if you observe their behavior, they look. Not everyone does and you may be an outlier, I'm not telling you what you do, just how it works in general.

 

That's probably so, but a subconscious glance is very different from a focused look. The latter is what's needed with a touchscreen. Studies have well shown that touchscreens take mental focus to operate. Even voice control does, because you have to think about how to phrase the command. Even with the so-called natural language voice control systems, people still think about how to phrase the command because it doesn't feel natural as a conversation with another human being. The mental focus is the issue with these newer input methods. Most humans can't really multitask as it is, so making them focus on the touchscreen etc., is just not going to work and will lead to even more distracted driving. We are already seeing some car makers locking out certain functions while the car is in motion, essentially admitting that the user interface is distracting while driving, and we haven't even touched on the elderly with degrading eyesight trying to operate these things.

 

AND, as you get older it gets worse—much worse! Couple these distractions with the three-ring circus our streets are becoming, with panhandlers on every corner & median, bicycles, electric scooters, e-bikes, every other pedestrian walking three dogs, roadwork everywhere, etc. and then toss in the fact that ALL of these folks—including the panhandlers—are on their phones, and driving in cities and suburbs is becoming less enjoyable every day. Changing the radio station should not require that I take my eyes off the road, but unless I want to talk to my car—which I do not—in my W223, I need to.

 

Even the Maybachs use the same capacitive touch buttons.

 

Exactly! I amended my post saying that we haven't even touched on the elderly in this discussion. Not only is the mental focus an issue the older you get, but so is the eyesight. I'm not that old yet. Turned 50 this year. I enjoyed 20/20 vision up into my early 40s, but have had presbyopia for a while now. I used to wear reading glasses at home and at work which was sufficient and didn't need anything for driving, but my current car despite not having a touchscreen and these new fangled capacitive buttons made me start wearing contact lenses, because the screens became too blurry. It was a great decision as I now enjoy great eyesight, but as I get older I may get to a point where contact lenses are no longer an option and glasses have their issues. We do tend to underestimate what age does to us. Most of these things are designed by young engineers who still have good eyesight and mental capacity.

 

They say that. But then they came up with the DBX, which is by far the cheapest AM, significantly lowering the brand's entry point. This is straight out of Porche's old playbook.

 

Not sure I read it but touchscreen or other silly finger pointing waving inputs stink in cars because cars movearound and hit bumps so your fingers and/or hand can suddenly move and next thing you now the instead of lower radio volume now it is maxed out blowing your eardrums....

Same reason we put lids on any drink in a car - to limit spills... you have nothing in car to limit mistakes on these input devices when car bounces around or whatever.

And multi-tasking is possible but not when your eyes need to be on each task and well one is close up and one is out windshield.

Look out windshield hard to find the one little ICON to rub your fingertip on to change station but you end up cranking volume or turning on heated seats or something else crazy!
Oh WAIT I did not pay the subscription for heated seats so no worries there!

Then the screen gets all nasty from fingertip oils and junk and when sun is just right looks like a kaleidoscope tie die Acid trip greatful dead-shirt.

I want my buttons and knows back.
I can control them without looking - keeping my eyes on the road like they should be... and forget voice control as we like to talk to each other when we travel and/or it just does not work worth a dayum.

All started with Steve JObs and his dislike for buttons... arggggggggggggggggggggggggggg!

No benefit to this touchscreen technology and touchpad input for car.

Vent off.
NExt car will be something from 50's though late 60's just before polution controls simple cheap repairs and simple controls- Give me back 8-track! LOL