Tesla will push an update to the Autopilot software in its vehicles, CEO Elon Musk announced yesterday — an upgrade that will essentially change how its cars “see” the world around them.
The Autopilot feature has been under the microscope lately, and for good reason. On May 7, a Model S was involved in a fatal collision while the semi-autonomous system was active, causing widespread critiques of the technology. Some went as far as calling Autopilot “an unsupervised wannabe,” but Musk was quick to point out that it is statistically safer than the average human driver — and has definitely saved a few lives as well. Tesla is constantly tweaking the software to improve capability and safety, culminating in what appears to be the most significant upgrade in recent history.
Major improvements to Autopilot coming with V8.0 and 8.1 software (std OTA update) primarily through advanced processing of radar signals
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 31, 2016
Currently, Tesla vehicles primarily use cameras to scan the road ahead, but with Autopilot 8.0, the electric vehicles will lean more on radar technology to move about safely. The sensors themselves have been included on all the automaker’s products as of October 2014, but they’ve been used as a supplement to the camera. Moving forward, radar will take the role of primary control sensor, something the company calls a major change — and challenge.
“This is a non-trivial and counter-intuitive problem, because of how strange the world looks in radar,” Tesla noted in a blog about the changes. “Photons of that wavelength travel easily through fog, dust, rain and snow, but anything metallic looks like a mirror.”
The most obvious benefit to the use of radar is an enhanced ability to detect objects in those low-visibility situations: rain, fog, snow, and so on. Hopefully, this will allow drivers to use Autopilot in areas outside of perpetually sunny California, translating to real-world practicality in a variety of conditions.
That said, Tesla admits that there are drawbacks to radar, such as reflections from metallic objects and size distortion. To combat this, the automaker has developed a more detailed scanning process and is implementing higher level fleet learning into its cars. Put simply, Teslas will be able to communicate with each other to log and disregard stationary objects like road signs and bridges, resulting in fewer false alerts. Initially the vehicle fleet will simply note the position of these items to compile a “geocoded whitelist,” with appropriate responses coming online later. For a full list of Autopilot 8.0’s changes, click here.
Read more: Should Tesla worry about the reincarnated Karma hybrid?
Once the new software goes live, we’ll be watching closely to see how the vehicles, drivers, and the rest of the world reacts. For more Tesla news, keep an eye on our Model S and Model 3 news roundups.
BYD has launched the third-generation Qin Plus DM-i in China, and the first thing that caught my eye is its price. According to CarNewsChina, the plug-in hybrid sedan starts at 79,900 yuan, which is about $11,980. That’s an incredibly low price for a brand-new car, especially by US standards.
What’s even more impressive is the range. The Qin Plus DM-i can drive up to 137 miles on electricity alone, which should cover most people’s daily commutes without using a drop of gas. Once the battery runs out, the 1.5-liter engine takes over. Thanks to its 17-gallon tank and roughly 91 mpg with a drained battery, the combined range reaches up to 1,423 miles.
Apple won the PC market’s worst quarter, but that’s not the entire story. It won the race by stumbling less than everyone else.
PC makers shipped just 57 million computers worldwide in Q3, which might look good, but it’s a 21% year-over-year plunge (via Counterpoint Research). And despite Apple’s Mac shipments falling by 11%, to 5.6 million, its market share rose from 8.7% to 9.8%. How did that happen?
Update (October 22 23:54 PT): In response to our query, GM clarified that offline recording support is already available on eligible vehicles. Like Tesla's Sentry Mode, it requires owners to connect a USB drive to save incident recordings, which can be viewed on the vehicle's infotainment screen. The upcoming Connected Cameras feature will build on this by giving owners remote access to these recordings via the revamped OnStar app, allowing them to check footage without walking out to their car.
General Motors has announced plans to add a new Connected Cameras feature to its OnStar service starting next year, giving drivers a way to monitor parked vehicles remotely and capture footage of certain incidents.