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0 pointskelp2y ago0 comments

In the case of Rivian they have been pushing very meaningful improvements on a roughly monthly basis via OTA.

I got my R1T in June 2023 and since here are a few things they've improved, just off the top of my head, not bothering to look it up:

1. Significant improvement to ride quality via different / better suspension tuning.

2. Ability to schedule warming the cabin and pre-condition the battery

3. Completely redesigned the UX for setting drive modes and suspension height (for the better IMO)

4. Added a ton of car info, like battery temp, motor temp, and other info like altitude, various angles the vehicle is at (for off-roading), degrees the front wheels are turned

5. Added additional settings for ride softness / firmness (I got this update yesterday and haven't tried it yet)

When an update is ready I get a notification in the car and from the Rivian app on my phone. I can just hit apply and it installs it.

IMO a USB install would be a substantially worse experience and it would be much less likely that customers would actually install it.

But, for the type of person who just wants the car to stay the same as it was the day they bought it, and never change, it's not the vehicle for them. Personally I really like that it's continually improving and I don't have to go in for service or even go out to the truck to do an update.

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Prcmaker2y ago

It's not that I don't want improvements, I modify my cars for exactly that reason, but I want reliability. Improvement to the ride quality shouldn't be a manufacturers after-thought. UX adjustments are nice, adding further visibility to system features, great. OTA updates on systems impacting car functionality or safety, no. These things should be tested thoroughly enough before release to not require periodic updating. They should be stable and tested enough that an difficult to apply update is a reasonable cost. These are not the systems to fail and fix on repeat.

steelframe2y ago

> But, for the type of person who just wants the car to stay the same as it was the day they bought it, and never change, it's not the vehicle for them.

I never said I didn't want updates. What I said is that I want to understand what the updates are and then choose to upgrade or downgrade when and how I see fit. Or better yet make the updates OSS and then let me do my own builds with the features and functionality I prefer as they are developed.

One thing that is right is that a Rivian is not for me, for a lot of additional reasons.

kelpOP2y ago

I wasn't trying to suggest what you personally want or don't want. Just that I could see how some people do not want their car interface to change, or even ride quality to change.

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