Why the fuck do cars still have analog speedometers? Surely digital ones would be more accurate and much easier to read without looking away from the road for too long.

JusticeForPorygon@lemmy.world to Showerthoughts@lemmy.world – 39 points –

Guys it's been 8 months. It was a bad take.

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I find I never actually look directly at an analogue speedometer, you kinda just know from the angle of the needle what speed you're doing

New to driving maybe?

That's probably why digital displays still have analog speedometer options. At a glance it's easier to tell what's happening with your speed, rev count, and other levels like fuel.

But much of that utility is useful for manuals and ICE-powered cars.

Unfortunately because of the digital spedometer, the analog one usually suffers.

My mid-2010s c-class has an analog spedometer which is absolutely useless as it does not have a full needle and the fonts, spacing and colors are made to blend in with the interior instead of being readable.

All this makes me use the digital one, which is very distracting and usually lagging behind, especially when quickly accelerating.

Reading very-fast-changing data is probably the only good argument I've seen for the superiority of analog guages in modern cars. A fast changing digital display is impossible to read. But practically speaking, when the data is changing that quickly, typically precision isn't important.

If car companies cared (which they clearly don't) they could make digital displays better, by having a low refresh rate when there is low acceleration (to avoid distracting the driver), increase the refresh rate under heavy acceleration to display more current data, and apply some kind of effect to the fast changing digits to convey a sense of how fast they're changing even if they're changing too fast to read. Think of the odometer style altitude readout on old airplanes, where even if you can't read the number you can tell wtf is up by how fast the numbers are spinning by.

This isn't to say that digital guages are better. They're just different. It's a personal preference thing.

But you're absolutely right that the analog guage has suffered from neglectful design in recent years.

My 2019 Jetta has a 100% digital instrument cluster. It's currently broken...just a black screen. It's neat how reliable analogue instruments are.

An analogue gauge is useful because you can see the rate of change not just the current value.

You can design a digital readout to intuitively provide the same. And I think you're overstating the importance of rate of change in analog guages that you find in commuter cars.

Some sort of scale on the side/bottom of the screen would solve that easy enough. It's only really useful when accelerating into the highway or from a red light, not terribly important.

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I think in this case analogue is actually easier to read. You don't need to actually read any of the numbers to know how fast you're driving, you just look at the angle of the needle.

The human brain is great at things like this, and less good at reading numbers, which is much more learnt.

Easier to read?

That would imply that an analog speedo is tough to read which is laughably wrong.

It can be? Not that it’s hard to read , but I felt it was harder to determine exact speeds in my last car. Am I going 41 of 40, 35 or 33. It’s not that big of a deal but I don’t really have that problem with digital.

Analog is occupied by speeds you will never use. 80 to 260 is useless to be and practically a waste of space for consumer cars.

Am I going 41 of 40

No speedo out there is accurate enough to distinguish between those two speeds.

I personally hate the digital cluster, I would rather have analog one with display in middle. I don't find that analog cluster needs more time to read.

This must be related to people in their 20's not knowing how to read a traditional clock anymore.

Yeah, probably not. It's just that digital is better, analog is just what folks are used to and that for some people means it's automatically better. I grew up with analog, my first cars had analog and if I've never seen it again, I wouldn't miss it.

The number of people on here who seem to think that an analog instrument cluster is connected directly to the things they're displaying, rather than connected to the ECU computer. Or that a PWM servo motor is more reliable than a screen. News flash: if you lose power to either, you aren't able to read it.

An well designed analog guage is easier to read out the corner of your eye, or at a quick glance. But that really only matters if you're racing, and even then it's dubious.

A poorly designed digital guage can be distracting at night, if they use a screen tech that has poor black levels, or have lots of bright elements on the screen at night. It basically shines a light at your face and interferes with your night vision. But most manufacturers are better than that, these days, it's not much different than the light that illuminates your analog gauges.

So really it's personal preference, and some people like to justify their preference with bullshit so that they can feel superior. YMMV.

I remember in the late 90s or so a car came out with an all digital instrument cluster. It made the news when they would completely fail, leaving people to not know anything about their speed or anything else about their car.

A speedometer is more reliable and easy to read. Even so, several cars have them. Some even project your speed in the windshield as part of a heads up display.

I don't know why this hasn't been universally adopted. I love my HUD,

Everything digital in a car is often handled by the "entertainment" system. Like a glorified radio. Manufacturers like to keep that as separate system from the car, so it's replaceable and upgradable and fail safe from the actual operation of the car.

Also, many car designs (of the cars on the road today) are 20 years old, when digital screens in cars had yet to prove reliability. Nobody wanted to risk having to replace screens just to show the speed. Some brands have had digital speedometers for ten years or so.

Anyway, digital speedometers also calculate the speed by magnets, so the GPS and speedometer might still show different speeds depending on the size of wheels just as badly as an analogue one. Again, it has to, because the operation of a car should not be dependent on a satellite system, f.i. in tunnels.

So in short: Digital speedometers are not more accurate and they're introducing points of potential failure.

I'm sorry but this is just wrong. Cars are very much digital for years now. Everything is connected together using CAN bus and handled by a computer. This computer is completely seperate from the entertainment system, which often isn't even connected to the CAN bus.

My car is 10 years old, not expensive and almost everything is digital on it. For example the gas pedal is simply a pedal connected to a sensor and a motor. The motor allows for force feedback and automatic actuation, whilst the sensor let's the computer know what I intend to do. Depending on what mode the car is in and what it sensors are saying, it'll interpret the signal differently.

All of the parts of the car communicate digitally and without this the car wouldn't be able to run. This has been the case for decades now. If you have a fuel injected car, it needs a computer to run at all, it needs things like a lambda sensor to run properly. Things like ABS and collision detection is handled through a computer, etc.

The speed as displayed on the analog speedometer is almost certainly read by a digital sensor and communicated through the bus as a digital signal. The computer then puts that signal into the actuator to move the needle. It's not like a belt and pulley system connected to the dash. Other systems in the car need to know the speed as well, for example the variable power steering needs to know if you are parking, driving through town or on the highway. This is all done digitally.

Yup, my old 1999 BMW had analog gauges and a lcd screen for other information like the Odometer, temp, maintenance information, etc. but you were able to enter a “secret” menu where it displayed the actual speed, there was also information like fuel tank levels and battery voltage as well!

This is partly true, but regulations do allow for a computer screen digital version of the basic safety display, as long as it can be demonstrated to be reliable and work without other systems like the infotainment system, and many manufacturers have implemented this.

IMO I think the answer to the OP is "it was a stylistic choice"

Yes definitely, the choice of a mechanical arrow or digital display is optional and stylistic. I'm just explaining why the digital speedometers aren't better currently.

Like you say, the problem is that the reading of speed has to be done without secondary systems. The digital display does seem more precise because it shows an exact digit, but it's not really. It just shows a digit instead of a mechanical arrow, which is still electronic btw.

In order to make it more precise we'd need secondary systems to calculate the speed. It doesn't have to be GPS, it could be done by other sensory inputs. Modern cars have cameras and it wouldn't be difficult to make a proper calculation using those or something else.

I also wish I had a precise fuel gauge, but what's the point really. It's not possible to calculate a range anyway, because it depends on the future driving.

It's a "need to have" versus "nice to have". People who need to have a precise speed probably have secondary systems for that specifically.

I like analog gauges. I very much like knobs. I dislike anything digital in a car other than a touch screen. Cars need to be able to be operated at a glance and by feel.

Touch screens are a pox upon vehicles, and need to be removed.

Disagree. I like having the screen for Android auto with music, podcasts, and especially gps. I do hate digital buttons when they aren't necessary but i like having the big main display.

Touch screen in cars isn't a good idea, though. They may distract the driver.

Yup! If I'm driving and want to change station or volume I need to be able to know what I'm doing without watching, and it already feels distracting and dangerous enough to me. With a touch screen I can't feel the buttons or knobs and I must look at the screen to do anything.

I never had a car with a touchscreen (my current car doesn't even have an AUX or USB port) so I don't know if it's already like this, but probably an hybrid between the two would be ideal. You get a touchscreen to thinker with it and create presets or whatever when you're not moving, and buttons to change song/station/preset/volume/whatever when driving

I much prefer analogue. Angle of the needle is a quick read + I don't like relying on a digital display for my essential information. Also aesthetics

I suspect speedometers are never completely accurate. So instead of an exact number, they'll use a needle and you can guess how fast you're approximately going

Wouldn't it be constantly fluctuating between speeds one or two numbers apart? Unless your foot is magic or you're in cruise control, lol. I feel like it could be distracting.

You could make like a circular shape on the screen with numbers correlating to the speed on different angles. Then maybe add some rectangle which points at the current speed and effectively changes the angle when the speed changes.

Oh wait..

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The more your car is computerized, the less control you have over it as the end user. The best cars on the road are the ones with no touch screens and no gps tracking bull crap. Analog speedometers and tachometers are just as good as a digital one and can be repaired easily if they fail. Try repairing your newfangled vehicle when over half of its functionality shits the bed because theres an error with the console software.

I prefer analog ones. I'm too OCD with digital ones trying to keep it at an even number

What I wonder is why more cars don't have HUDs that are projected onto the windshield. That tech has been around and in cars for over 25 years. You don't have to take your eyes off the road at all.

I have both and prefer the digital one. I find it much easier to drive a precise speed with it.

I had a VW Tiguan that had both, but the digital one didn't poll very often so it was incredibly unreliable. My Audi Q7 has both too, but the analog one is on a digital display, which is kind of weird to think about. Like a computer using an analog clock.

My Lexus has a digital speedometer in the center, surrounded by an arc they can be used to show RPM or fuel efficiency.

TBH I hate screens in my car and am trying to buy one without one (which seems impossible now)

Analog is less likely to fail, imo easier to read and is cheaper to service. There’s also the fact that the majority of drivers have had analog speedometers their entire life and getting rid of them will turn some drivers off of buying the car

Car manufacturers won't spend extra on a fancy feature unless they can't sell without it. That's why most cars have such nasty low-res screens for the entertainment system, when a nice high res one (like the one you have in your phone) would only cost a few quid more.

I see all these things about the digital gauges breaking on them and I find it pretty funny that out of every car I ever had/had access to, only one ever had the speedometer fail, and it was an analogue one. The needle itself on the display broke and would just swing back and forth wildly. I used my phone to get a speedometer app that used the gyro in the phone until I could get it fixed.

Cognitive load. Good operator experience, user interface, you want the operator of the vehicle to require the least amount of thinking to know about the vehicle. It's critical data they'll need an emergency is, and in emergencies, people's cognitive abilities go down quite a bit.

Just think about how you turn the radio down to find an address on the street, multiply that times a thousand. That's how people think in an emergency

My car has both digital and analog on the dash.

The position of the needle on the dial is easier to see with peripheral vision, versus numbers.

Some cars have a digital speedo HUD displayed on the windshield. I find it too distracting.

My old Scion had a digital one. I think it’s an aesthetic preference.

My friend has a newish Nissan Leaf electric car which has an analog speedometer. That baffles me since everything else is digital.

You're aware that luxury cars may have both, e.g. Aston Martin DB11

Luxery cars? I've got a 10 year old POS Chevy and it has both, it's a pretty standard feature I think