[Jason]

2023 BMW iX M60 First Test: Drives Better Than Its Numbers

Link to review:https://www.motortrend.com/reviews/2...t-test-review/

[cfm56d7b]

Offering an alternate perspective on buttons vs touch screen controls.

From Swedish car magazine:

https://www.vibilagare.se/english/ph...ars-test-finds

[TXSchnee]

Originally Posted by cfm56d7b

Offering an alternate perspective on buttons vs touch screen controls.

From Swedish car magazine:

https://www.vibilagare.se/english/ph...ars-test-finds

There is still an iDrive controller in vehicles with iDrive 8, you don't have to use the touchscreen if you don't want to.

[Paladin1]

The other unknown in all of the "buttons vs screens" tests is how familiar is the user with the systems involved, and what function they are performing. Most testers I see reviewing are coming from an "all buttons" environment, and are unfamiliar and uncomfortable with a new interface, with minimal - if any - time learning it. A good example in my iX is activating/deactivating seat and steering wheel heating. Sure, wading through menus is cumbersome and time-intensive, and could certainly be measured as "hard and takes a long time," however, just saying "turn off steering wheel heat" or "set steering wheel heat to low" requires no action from me at all other than speaking (and once mastered voice control for me is 100% reliable) - and it doesn't matter if it takes 5 seconds - turning off steering wheel heating is not time-critical. And I never need to take my attention off driving to push anything. Same for dimming the sunroof, or actually setting the following distance, or programming navigation. And the same for turning on a host of comfort features.

I mute and unmute the audio system by poking two fingers at the screen, without touching or looking at anything, or just tell the car to play a particular audio source without fiddling with the radio (would be interesting to see statistics on how many crashes involved pushing a physical radio button). My "go home" command is an open and closed fist, or just saying "go home." I find I'm using physical buttons less and less, and when I need it, a "button" is available in the menu (which is usually customizable for quick use). And many settings are set and forget, or automatic - I won't be frequently changing my interior lighting, or how my headlights behave, or most driving settings. Buttons have had their day, but I expect we'll see less of them as automation and other, and actually better, user interfaces improve.

[BLKSAPPE92]

I’ve worked for multiple car companies. They all have problems with the touchscreens on their all dash setups. What they needed to do is keep the soft plush or touch sensitive buttons or voice control

[Louis_BE]

Just give us 5 physical shortcut buttons and 2 dials for Temp control,
It’s that simple.

[buddenfan]

So.. hows is the car?

[JJacksonIII]

omg the crazy opinions regarding physical buttons.... The touch screen works great and looks great. Lose the pig headedness and get used to new tech.

[ggalanis]

Originally Posted by JJacksonIII

omg the crazy opinions regarding physical buttons.... The touch screen works great and looks great. Lose the pig headedness and get used to new tech.

Contrary to what you may be perceiving, in most cases, it is not people being pig headed, but as always, there are exceptions.

The touch screen works great for some things, particularly settings that you rarely or never change while driving. Those don't need to have dedicated buttons, although in some specific cases could still be preferable over burying it in a menu. The issue most reasonable people have is when you have to use the touchscreen to change something while driving. Whether the tech is new or not, touchscreens provide zero tactile feedback and require more time looking away from the road than a physical button would to press and some people prefer that.

A good example of that is the distance setting for the radar cruise control. In previous BMWs, that was a button on the steering wheel. In the iX, it is buried in the settings or perhaps you set a shortcut for it. Some people never changed the distance setting. Others fiddle with it all the time depending on traffic conditions. I personally used to change it to allow more distance in some traffic situations to avoid being super jerky, sometimes in slippery conditions I set it to more distance but had it set to the closest distance most of the time. I tried the adaptive setting in the iX and it does not follow close enough for my liking in normal conditions. I now have it set to the closest distance with no adaptive behavior. But now, I never change it to allow more distance in the situations I did so in the past because I prefer disengaging the cruise control over looking at the screen (and thus not the road)for the time it will take me to hit the right buttons.

You can obviously think of similar examples with tons of other buttons. Voice control can make sense for some cases, but frankly it doesn't work well for everything. Just like you can use voice control to roll down your window or use the button on the door. I'm willing to bet the button gets used more often even if you know you can use voice command to do it.

[TXSchnee]

As a counter point, these are not touch controls in my Cayenne, they are still buttons, just under a completely smooth glass. Still physical options for climate and volume, but this isn’t any different than having to access a touch screen.

[drbluedevil]

Originally Posted by TXSchnee

As a counter point, these are not touch controls in my Cayenne, they are still buttons, just under a completely smooth glass. Still physical options for climate and volume, but this isn’t any different than having to access a touch screen.

I beg to differ. We also have a 2022 Cayenne, and making specific changes to the HVAC functions like temperature, fan speed, level of seat ventilation or heating, steering wheel heating, and even massage can be done with physical buttons as quickly as I can get my hand to the correct button by muscle memory without taking my eyes off the road.

In my iX, if I want to set my driver's side heating to level 3 or 4 without turning on the passenger's side, set steering wheel to 2, and set driver's seat+radiant heat to 3, I have to take my eyes off the road, push that stupid climate section of the touch screen, wait 3 seconds (308 feet traveled at 70 mph), then do a gorilla arm press of the section of the screen that now becomes the HAVC control. If I use the spinning wheel of misery to scroll through functions, it takes even longer with my eyes STILL on the touchscreen, since I have to see where the cursor lands. The voice command takes even longer to work, interrupts what I'm listening to, works only occasionally, often does something other than what I asked it to do, and is much more distracting and time-consuming than just biting the bullet with the fu&%ing touchscreen.

I love the car, but it's in spite of the absolute trash UI.

To the engineers who I hope read this forum: you can STILL make a clean, modern-looking car while having some very well thought-out, multifunctional HVAC buttons. You can put the steering wheel heater button on the wheel itself and hide it, like in the Cayenne. You can have an out-of-the way array of seat control buttons on the side by the doors and attached to the seat themselves (also like the Cayenne). You can have a very tidy interior AND have a few buttons!

[TXSchnee]

I still look down to access the seat heating/ventilation buttons on my Cayenne (ordered and purchased in 2020), I have the 18 Way seats so no massage option. I personally find the PCM location much easier to use as a driver than the iDrive screen on the iX, I don't have to reach forward at all to use the touchscreen in the Porsche, I do in the iX. I am not 100% pleased with no buttons on the iX, but it hasn't been that big of an adjustment really, especially when this is cheaper for manufacturers, so will be wide spread in all vehicles within 5 years or so.