Why You Can't Buy A Car Or Get It Fixed On The 20th Of June

[raison de arizona]

Word on the streets was that on the new BMWs you had to pay monthly for heated seats. People rebelled. Not sure what became of that.

[MN-Skeptic]

I'm waiting for cars to catch up with other equipment.

For the last two decades increasingly telecom and networking equipment mfgs built a single form factor with all the hardware, jacks, ports, buttons, etc. You bought the base model, and enabled the features / functions you wanted through purchased non-transferable entitlements. You either connected the device to the internet so the OEM could do it remotely, or they sent you an email with long strings of characters you C&P'd into the appropriate fields of the device configuration GUI. It lowered OEM costs because they only had to build one or two product families. It also enhanced the customer experience too. An upgrade could be purchased in the future as the need arose.

Be careful what you wish for. Features that can be enabled can also be disabled. And, worst of all, they can become subscription features. Don't pay for a month, all of a sudden your heated seats no longer work.

[sugar magnolia]

The rule in our family growing up was you buy a car, you buy a Chilton's. It saved my ass many a time when I was first learning to drive, if for nothing than self-diagnosing issues before I took it to the shop. I learned that if you go in knowing, at the very least, which system was hosed they were more likely to not try to upsell you to a new engine every time if all you needed was the carb float adjusted.

[raison de arizona]

I had a service manual for my VW that was conveniently printed with every other page blank, so you had a way to change the page with your greasy hand without ruining the book.

[MN-Skeptic]

My husband used to download the manuals for his outdoor equipment - lawn mower, snow blower, power blower, etc. - and print out and laminate the pages he would be needing when doing service on those items.

[Sam the Centipede]

I'm waiting for cars to catch up with other equipment.

For the last two decades increasingly telecom and networking equipment mfgs built a single form factor with all the hardware, jacks, ports, buttons, etc. You bought the base model, and enabled the features / functions you wanted through purchased non-transferable entitlements.

IBM (and probably other computer companies) had a variation on that in the 1970s: the processor board of a mainframe would be "slugged" so it ran at some fraction of its maximum speed. Business increases, you need a more powerful company? – pay IBM a bucketful of dollars and the technician comes along, opens the cabinet, moves or removes a jumper and pow! a faster processor! Perhaps he also changed some stickers, I dunno, before my time.

[keith]

Teslas have that kind of over the air upgrades.

[John Thomas8]

CDK is still not functioning at all, those same 15,000 dealerships are still not selling cars.

it's getting kinda ugly for a bunch of people that aren't in management positions as if they're not working they're not getting paid.