Cars are running out of screens. The dashboard is a jumble of numbers, icons, indicator lights, and gauges. In some vehicles, the display built into the center console is bigger than our televisions in certain rooms at home. But drivers’ and passengers’ appetite for more information isn’t subsiding, so the dashboard and entertainment console are about to get a companion: the windshield.
At the Detroit auto show, which runs until Jan. 25, you’ll find demonstrations of cars with built-in projectors displaying speed, range, turn-by-turn directions, and other crucial data along the bottom of the windshield. Head-up displays””developed to keep fighter pilots’ eyes on the sky rather than on the instruments in the cockpit””have existed in some form for cars since at least the 1980s, but they’ve mostly functioned as a novelty for high-end clientele. In the past year, however, HUD technology has made its way into some Mazdas and Priuses as a way to manage information overload for everyday drivers.
Automakers have been adding a flood of information designed to keep drivers safe””some requested by customers, others mandated by governments””but it risks having the opposite effect. As weird as it sounds, projecting text and graphics onto the windshield may be less distracting to drivers than forcing them to look down at cluttered in-car screens””or worse, their mobile phones. A HUD, which sits within the driver’s line of sight, would be free of “check engine” and “change oil” lights, and only display the alerts a driver might need at any given moment. Hyundai, Toyota, and General Motors expect the HUD to go mainstream very soon.
I just purchased a Mazda 3i Sport sedan, primarily for the excellent fuel mileage rating. While this is not the top-of-the-line model, it has a 7″ touchscreen through which the radio is controlled, as well as my phone via Bluetooth technology. I can play music from my phone, a USB memory stick, and the radio. Higher models & trim levels have all this plus a CD player, navigation, and a back up camera, all controlled through this touch screen, which is also controlled through a knob on the center console.
I am finding this touch screen to be a major distraction. It does have a “blank screen” setting, and that is where I tend to put it so my eyes are not constantly drawn to it. I can see how this could be a larger problem than sending texts on a smartphone.
I can hardly wait until I can spend the final moments of my life playing angry birds on my windshield while driving.
TV screens and projectors break—sometimes at inconvenient times—and then what kind of controls are we left with?
“As weird as it sounds, projecting text and graphics onto the windshield may be less distracting to drivers than forcing them to look down at cluttered in-car screens”
Not only that, but it leaves your hands free to take extreme evasive action when an SA-16 locks on to your exhaust signature… 🙂