But I look at it as unnecessary feature creep, just more stuff to break. It's like they mastered making cars reliable (if cared for), and now the industry giants want to undo that but tacking on tons of "hey, what about this?" gadgets. Just run out to your car and start it: costs you 30 seconds and some precipitation on your collar?
It breaks in a robust way. Like an escalator. If it breaks, it just becomes that run-out-and-start.
If it costs next to nothing then it's a good feature. It's like the remote for my TV. Sure I can get up and change channels, or I can walk and start the car. but chances are I'm gonna say "nah" and just cold start it. I'm not paying $8 month but I do pay $40/yr for the volvo version (although that has a bit more than just remote start. I use the remote heater start 100x times more than remote start though).
I mean if the heater is remote started then why wouldn't the engine be. It's just the 2nd step of the heating process.
> I mean if the heater is remote started then why wouldn't the engine be. It's just the 2nd step of the heating process.
Ok, that just registered in my brain. If it is a feature where people need to warm their cars before the cars even work, then it is pretty shitty to start charging a subscription fee for it. And if it is incremental, then I see your point. Can I still hate on touchscreens and lack of knobs, tho? :)
Thats how cars work in very low temps :)
Or rather, they work anyway but it’s less friendly to the environment plus if you drive it cold you also need to spend a lot of time getting the ice off the windows, which at least comes “for free” with a 15 minute heating and a 3 minute pre-start.
The heater I think isn’t even possible to start from the car. Might be deep in some menu in that case. I only know the touchscreen way…
But I look at it as unnecessary feature creep, just more stuff to break. It's like they mastered making cars reliable (if cared for), and now the industry giants want to undo that but tacking on tons of "hey, what about this?" gadgets. Just run out to your car and start it: costs you 30 seconds and some precipitation on your collar?