Longing for the day I can buy an EV that's not a smartphone on wheels is like...
6h 36m ago by startrek.website/u/IcedRaktajino in simpsonsshitposting@sh.itjust.works from startrek.website
No touch screens, no telemetry, no cellular modems, no wifi, no apps, no subscriptions, no infotainment.
Hitting the gas in an EV is like filming with a digital camera.
Yeah. Gas [pedal] is used here in the same way the "save" icon is still a floppy disk.
It's a skeuomorph!
What a fucked up word
it's easy and convenient?
My phone has a system app known as a "dialer" despite not having a round dial.
On a broader note, this is a failure of capitalism in which products can never be perfected.
There are sooo many technologies that we fully figured out years ago but they can’t just make it optimal and move on.
This is why we have washing machines using internet for whatever reason.
Backed by amazon? LOL if you think it won't still have a cellular radio and full tracking suite installed.
Slate has stated that they will not have a cellular or other type of connection. It does need some type of connection to do software updates, and that will be from your phone using their app to the truck via USB.
They've also stated they won't track your driving data. You can opt in to share data about the truck's health through the app for servicing purposes, but that's all. They've also promised not to sell any kind of data to third parties.
That could always change, but I'm on the wait list for one and there are people on the slate forums who are serious about privacy and are watching this and seem pretty happy for now.
Software updates via the phone app 😒
That's better than ICE cars having to go to the dealer to update their software, which is the current industry standard.
I don't recall the last time my Saturn Ion needed a software update
Given they stopped making them before smart phones were a thing I imagine not, but that's also why your SiriusXM no longer works if you're not a brokie and got a level 3 trim.
There's a reason I said 'current industry standard,' things from almost the last century barely qualify as vehicles by modern standards, and your car couldn't pass a safety inspect for sale in almost any country today.
Think I'd be driving a car that's old enough to smoke if I wasn't a brokie?
I was more poking fun at the idea of a car needing software updates in general. It's like a toaster or a television needing an update. It's a machine that should be able to perform its functions entirely offline
Pretending that any software is 100% accurate in a capitalist setting is a ridiculous thing to do; and every television and car since the 1970s has some software involved.
With cars it generally works well enough long enough in enough cases that that direct ECU or other computer patching isn't needed, because who cares if you have a misfire in every 100,000 cycles as long as the car still runs.
I was originally referring to the same thing in ICE cars that are in EVs, i.e. the infotainment and gauge display systems which are the majority of software updates in either case study, but let's not pretend this is the 1950s for ICE cars; yes your ECU on your shitbox probably does legitimately have a software update that has better tuning, especially if the same engine was used in two separate production years. Guess what they updated to get more performance despite it having the same engine in order to justify the next year release? The fucking software. Also many recalls are software based these days for all the things that aren't directly mechanical, like airbag, or lane assist, or backup cameras, or fuel systems, or the ABS controller. All of those things will inevitably have a software flaw. All of those things can be updated, and are updated at least once during the production cycle if only to add additional hardware support when new hardware is swapped into the same model.
EVs, because they are so much more simple than ICE cars in every single possible way, lean harder on software since that's the only thing that can really be effectively separated into distinct packages and models until solid state batteries come about.
Pretending that any software is 100% accurate in a capitalist setting is a ridiculous thing to do; and every television and car since the 1970s has some software involved.
Good thing I didn't do that
Slate is the 2nd best choice rn.
First best is buying an older car for cheap and spending some money to repair/upgrade
Not exactly a choice, they don't actually exist yet.
I'm quite excited for the Slate to be released. Electric truck, optional SUV conversion, decent price, minimum frills, customize it yourself if that's your thing. That sounds so much better than wheeled tank with built-in privacy concerns.
I just wish there was a version with a full size bed. Not that any of the other light truck options are any better in that regard.
Yeah, I've been watching that. It is supposed to start fulfilling orders this year (last I read anyway), but it'll be at least next year before I can probably look into one. And even then, I'd want to let some other/braver people test them out for reliability and repair-ability.
Cars also need to be smaller for the sustainable transition. We need to disconnect ego from car. Consider it's spending about 95% of its life parked.
Smaller cars or busses. Or trains. Or trams. Or electric bikes. Or push bikes.
Basically there's lots of options that don't make it look like you're going to war.
And it's only $20,000...$25000...$30000. soon I'll have one parked next to my Aptera, and Tesla Roadster.
This exactly. Slate sounds nice until you realize they're asking $30K for a vehicle with manual locks/windows, no fucking radio, and 150 miles of range.
I don't like the idea of not having a decent screen for Carplay but I think the upside of this one compared to many other vehicles is that it won't depreciate as badly. No infotainment to go out of date, etc.
no telemetry
In 2026?
I'd settle for Android/Apple Auto and no cellular
I would also like "turn" please
That requires a premium subscription.
One of the most appealing things about Slate motors is that they seem to lack all the telemetry bullshit.
The least appealing thing about them is that Jeff Bezos is a primary investor.
I'm skeptical they'll actually come with no telemetry or other forms of anti-features. The investors, like Bezos, will likely push for it. They have a new CEO, who comes from Amazon. There is a federal mandate for all US vehicles to come with driver monitoring technology starting in 2027.
Yeah, I am skeptical about it too. We will have to wait and see I guess.
I'm also wondering how they are going to deal with the requirement for all new cars after 2018 to have a backup camera/screen. Maybe it will just go through the tiny little screen behind the steering wheel?
Edit: I just looked it up. Seems the backup camera will go through the instrument panel screen.
No camera filming me please.
if you’re american isn’t that the chevy bolt?
The bolt has buttons and no real smart features but it also has an infotainment tablet. It also still has gps and Wi-Fi and whatever else as options, so I don't particularly trust it not to be tracking everything. It's certainly miles better than most of the competition but it's still a modern car.
As I understand it, one of the other advantages of the bolt is that it's fairly easy to disconnect. There's a dedicated fuse you can pull which will disable the telemetry as well as the microphone and a lot of the related infotainment system functions like gps. Or for those who want more of those functions, you can open the panel behind the screen, unplug the antenna, and replace it with with a terminator so that it thinks it's intact but has no signal.
Of course, it will still try to send data home through your phone if you let it. Apparently it can do that through android auto and carplay if they are connected via bluetooth but not over USB.
There are guides to disabling OnStar effectively which should assuage those concerns. Well, for the 23 and older models. Not sure about the new stuff.
A quick terminator on the cellular antenna makes it receive no cell signal - the other features that don't rely on cellular all continue working.
Honda-san I beg of you, revist your classic designs and drop an electric motor in to them. You will become more rich
Bonus points if you can make it so that all the aftermarket suspension parts that already exist for those classic designs still fit. Ultra-bonus points if the body is externally identical so aero and body mods still fit.
Manual Gears (5 speed)!
Do EVs even have transmissions? I ask this legitimately, I know shit for dick about cars beyond how to change oil
They have one drive reduction gear, just one speed, no shifting.
I'm gonna have to ask what that means. Cars are just something my autism just does not comprehend
Internal combustion engines are very picky about how fast they spin, since they get their power from burning fuel the rate at which fuel enters the cylinders to burn correlates strongly to the power they have available. And since each cycle of a cylinder burns about the same amount of fuel the faster the engine spins the more power it generates.
This is why internal combustion engine vehicles have gearboxes (transmission in the US?) to ensure that you can spin the engine fast even while the wheels are slow) or stopped) so you have enough power to start the car.
Electric motors by contrast generate power through the strength of their electromagnetic fields, which is just how much current gets pushed through the electromagnets. How fast the motor spins just changes how fast the electronics have to "move" the generated field without changing the strength, so you get similar power even at slow speeds.
So electric motors have enough torque at low speed that you can start your car without needing a gearbox.
Note: this post is a gross simplification and probably mis-uses some terminology but it should give a general understanding of why the transmissions are different.
Okay pretend they are trains without tracks
I’d honestly love this. I don’t even care if the stick doesn’t actually switch gears and it can just give me fake engine rev sounds. I just miss driving manual and paddle shifters just aren’t the same.
The Hyundai Ioniq 5 N wowed the cartubers crowd back in 2024/25 because it simulated a lot of the driving feel of gas cars.
Maybe keep an eye on Hyundai.
Edit: although I don't think they have simulated stick shifting
I don't know why they turned their station wagon into a sports EV, and then waited like 3 years to do it with their sedan.
They were doing paddle shifters in the Ioniq. Toyota was working on a car with a six speed shifter and a clutch. I don’t even care if it’s simulated shifting, I’d still get one.
This article is from 2023, but it has more info on it. The manual transmission from Toyota is expected to go to production this year I think.
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a45754176/toyota-manual-ev-prototype-drive/
There are no gears on an EV. They just go.
And man, do they go!
And a cool loud exhaust to attract women.
No f off with manual gears. They are unnecessary and make driving complicated. I hat that in my country manual gear cars are the norm, especially for compact cars. That limits massively the options I have if I'm looking to change my car and also makes me comparatively pay more. Prolly one of the very few things the US has done right, namely the proliferation of cars with automatic gears. It is just so freakin more comfortable to drive an automatic than it is a manual, especially for driving within cities.
Gas? No thanks.
I think they meant the pedal.
Yes that's the joke.
ohh sorry, i didn't notice it was a joke I feel dumb lol.
Can't even call it a throttle
I guess I'll have to stick with "accelerator"
Dunno what it'll be called when I trade in my motorbike for an electric one someday
An electric bike should be called a motorbike. Your motorbike should have been called an engine bike from the start. Motors are electric, engines use internal combustion.
In a perfect world, yes, but actually, no.
I just know what I learned in College when I earned an AA in automotive repair. Motor is used interchangeably in common parlance, but that is an incorrect usage.
But then we also need to call the brake the accelerator, too.
I bought the Kona (2024) and it's the best car I could ask for. It has some smart things of course, but I have no subscriptions, no phone requirement, I mostly just listen to FM radio. It's been the best car I've ever owned.
Features look nice. I guess I'm just gonna have to get over my "crossover" hate and buy a car that looks like a low-top roller skate lol. Was hoping the industry would have moved on from that unfortunate design by now.
We tried to find a small EV everywhere. Bolt was sluggish and had weird controls, leat just hasn't been updated in 10 years, and so we landed on the kona. Definitely larger than we wanted, but batteries are big. At least worth a test drive I'd suggest
I had the opposite experience between the bolt and the Kona! The smaller bolt is a bit faster and I found drove more on the car side of the car/SUV split than the kona, and while the button placement took getting used to it has one for almost everything. We also bought while the tax credits were in effect so it was $10k cheaper for 4 miles less range.
leat just hasn't been updated in 10 years
I thought I read the Leaf got a fairly big update recently. I'll have to check on that when I have some time.
I think that was this year, so in 2024 it was super outdated but it's better now. I think it's also a crossover now unfortunately
I was searching a few years ago, so makes sense they'd update it right after I got mine
makes sense they'd update it right after I got mine
That's how my life works too haha.
And also why I'm so hesitant to settle for a body style I dislike (seriously, crossovers: be a sedan, be an SUV, or be a station wagon; trying to be all 3 is just failing at everything...but I digress lol). As soon as I settle and buy one, I just know they'll bring back sedans.
I would have loved a sedan, but none exist here. I figured that hopefully by buying a Kona it would show that at least one american is buying the smallest car he apparently can. It was a good tradeoff.
As for sedans making a comeback, I doubt it. Sadly, I think the industry has firmly moved away from them.
There have been three generations of leaf, updated 2017 and 2025. Now 225 miles range with active temp control for battery.
Nissan has sold over 650,000 leaves.
The leaf JUST got updated finally after they made the Ariya (much bigger, already discontinued because it wasn’t profitable enough.)
But yeah I think if anyone wants ANY new car without any of those features, good luck. You’re required to have a screen for a backup camera for anything since I think 2012? So there’s gonna at minimum be something.
Nissan Leaf was updated three times last 10 years.
I like my Kia EV6. We were in the market for an EV and test drove all of the ones we could try. I liked the KIA because it had a lot of physical buttons for my regular things. There's no real subscriptions except for things we don't use. There's a touchscreen for a lot but I can get by without using it mostly
Kia allows you to disable data acquiring in options.
Oh. I should do that in my car. Love that
Slate EV
There are quite a few EVs that satisfy those criteria on the market!
e-bikes are such a wild west of manufacturers. what's a good resource to get good reviews?
Might fine question, and honestly, I don't know. I'm old-school, still riding an acoustic bike. If I were to buy an electric bike, I think I'd spend the money to stick with the long-time brands, mostly for availability of parts and quality battery packs. There are a lot of cheap bikes with obscure brand names, and occasionally, I see news articles about their battery packs starting apartments and houses on fire. But, also, since the battery packs are generally custom-fit to the frame, having a source of replacements available is a good idea. That brings to mind a suggestion: If you have a local bike shop nearby, it's worth stopping in to talk to the mechanics (not the sales staff) about what's good
There are so many issues to consider. Who makes the motor? Who makes the battery? Will you still be able to buy that battery in 5 years? Will it still work if the company that sold it goes out of business? You can get cheap Chinese e-bikes for 1/4 the cost of American-branded e-bikes. But, sometimes the American ones are just Chinese ones with a sticker slapped on that doubles the price.
From what I've been able to figure out, motors made by Bafang and batteries made by Bafang or Samsung are thought to be ones that should still be around in a few years.
Then there are all the other issues to consider: hub drive or mid-drive? Pedal assist or throttle? Rear derailleur, internally geared hub, or continuously variable transmission?
I've been thinking of getting one and am ready to part with my money, but I can't justify the price of some of the North-American / European labelled bikes, but don't want to waste money on a Chinese one that might only work for a few weeks.
Even more variables which I hadn't considered. Heep us posted if you get one
Wonder if electric motorcycles are in any better of a state
I think they're even worse.
What I did was get a Craigslist special and slap a hub in there (along with a shitton of accessories)
It looks like you can buy a fully assembled ebike for the price of just an ebike conversion kit.
yeah, but what's the fun in that
That's easy: they are all garbage.
Hey. I was just going to bring up my etrike.
Gas, you say? Are you sure?
How do they generate electricity where you come from?
Mostly coal in the US
Is that where they come from? Because anyone with a wrinkly organ in their skull knows that EV is just gas with extra st3ps
But like a lot more efficient to burn it in a power plant than millions/billions car engines that don't capture the energy well anyways. And then at least renewables can be used in the power grid as well.
Ok. How well does that work with aging electrical infrastructure in places like Boston or Milan?
I mean, like, I totally get you vibing.
Unfortunately infrastructure was built when the world was new. What we all got is what we get, now and forever.
You improve the infrastructure? And while we're at it, build more infrastructure for walking, cycling and public transport instead of inducing further demand for cars
So tear it all down?
The amount of electricity generated by renewables an ICE car can use is always 0%. That is not true for EVs.
Gas?
Accelerator!
From my point of view the steering wheel and brake pedal are accelerators as well.
You are technically correct. The best kind of correct.
Only in combination with a previous third type of accelerator.
Acceleratrix!
For about $8k you can convert a VW beetle to electric.
Steering. You also want steering.
Heated seats are a must if you drive anywhere that gets cold. Saves you a lot of miles. Backup cams are mandated on cars in the US now, and if you're gonna have a screen, you should probably include some navigation so the car can pre-condition the battery before you get to a charger.
Well, if you're gonna do those (pretty necessary IMHO) QoL concessions, you might as well give the user the option to integrate it with their phone, so they don't have to wonder if the car got enough charge, or if some asshole yanked out the plug. If you're reporting that info to the phone, you can include some controls to start/stop charging or set certian charging targets for certain charging stations. If you're including controls, you might as well piggyback some basic lock, unlock, pop trunk features to the phone, and if you're already letting the phone unlock the car, you can pretty easily include proximity unlocking. Since you've got a data connection to the phone, you can stream music and data from the car to the phone and vis-versa. You could put in another screen and physical controls for managing the music, but you already have one in the car for the rear cameras anyway, so why not just integrate the whole damn thing and now we're at most modern features of EVs, minus the goofy handles and driver automation.
I could forgo heated seats before I could a heated steeringwheel
You derived modern EVs by adding a bunch of features I wouldn't want.
Yes. And steering.
No one uses steering anymore. Too busy watching tiktok on my phone while trying to do my makeup during my morning drive.
So, things you can do on a train or similar transport
Don't forget honk honk punch, Gas gas gas.
I think those days are coming to an end, especially now that gas is expensive everyone is buying up the older evs that dont have those things like the older Chevy bolts
Chevy Bolts have almost every piece of modern tech in cars. Display screens, limited physical dials and buttons, car and pedestrian sensors, cameras everywhere (though luckily none in the cabin facing the inside), GPS, OnStar, and data telemetry. The last two can at least be mitigated by terminating the data line antenna cables to stop the car from phoning home all the time.
OnStar is the worst for privacy, it tracks everything you do, even your weight.
They have physical buttons for just about everything you regularly need to do. Otherwise yeah they're fully connected and have all the sensors for tracking
Yeah but I feel going forward it will be harder to find something like this. At least my 2022 has buttons for all the important things like air conditioner and stuff.
The new bolt gets rid of android auto so you would need to give the car data for any of the functionality, on the older ones using graphene os with sandboxed android auto you can still use sideloaded apps and stuff.
My brother drives an older fiat ev and that is pretty much just a converted old gas car with a key ignition and everything but the range is only like 80 miles
Will it come with a supply of muumuus to decorate my beautiful body?
Fully open hardware and software would be nice. I don't plan to tinker with it. But it would give peace of mind to know that it can't be enshittified and that discontinuation of the model will not leave me out of luck for spare parts.
Come on what is this image's original context what is this
Little known TV show called the Simpsons.
Okay, but what's the context? Why is Homer on a dress going "gas, break, honk"?
King Sized Homer: he deliberately gains enough weight to qualify as disabled, allowing him to work from home:
"Hee hee hee. I pity those poor suckers on the freeway. Gas, brake, honk. Gas, brake, honk. Honk, honk, punch. Gas, gas, gas."
Edit: whoever wrote the quote on IMDb couldn't spell. Fixed.
OOOOOOH!
Thanks :)
The Smart ForTwo EV was just what you asked for. It did have a cellular modem. But you could just unplug it very easily.
And make it small on the outside and as big as possible on the inside, with the back seats level with the trunk when folded down
My first car was a 2003 Suzuki Ignis and the way the rear seats folded down was the absolute best. It made it act like a small van!
China's partly to blame for this, since people there absolutely go nuts for cars that are basically a smartphone on wheels. And since China's such a huge market, companies do mainly produce things that sell well there.
You want gas in your electric vechile. Better drive it to taco bell then.
Braindead take. ICE cars all do the exact same shit. This stuff has NOTHING to do with the powertrain of a vehicle.
Nobody said that ev's have that shit because they're evs. It's a new car thing, and unfortunately there aren't many electric cars that are old enough to not have this stuff (ignoring Tesla, since they kinda started the trend and and also because they're nazis).
Tesla started this because they oversold EVs for years on the highest profit margins in the industry. They filled the cars with gadgets and screens to add the perception of value because car buyers are morons.
Older ones aren't so bad. Too bad we don't have EVs without the "smart" stuff.