Behind the wheel gadgets
- 11 Jan 07, 02:13 AM
Confession time. I only have a tape deck in my car.
This may seem surprising, for someone who surrounds himself with cutting-edge technology in the rest of his life.
I just enjoy driving too much. Flinging my ageing Saab round country lanes to the soundtrack of its wheezing turbo.
Not so delegates at CES in Las Vegas.
The automotive hall is full of "Pimped Up" vehicles with LCD screens and subwoofers filling every inch of interior space.
There's even a truck with TVs under the wheel arches. Presumably to entertain the thieves who are stealing its expensive looking alloys.
But the real buzz this year is "telematics".
It's one of those vague terms that you sense was dreamed-up first, before anyone was quite sure what it should mean.
No-one here is really able to define it.
Depending on who you ask, it's anything from GPS to having a full PC running in the dashboard.
One demo vehicle I looked at has a 1.6ghz dual core processor, 2GB RAM and a 120GB hard drive - that's more than my laptop!
For all the enthusiasm here, no-one actually talks about enhancing the enjoyment of driving.
I can't help feeling it's all about giving the A to B commuter something to distract them from the traffic jams and road-rage van drivers.
While that's fine for some… it's not what revvs my engine.
I'd sooner have more engine power than processing power anyday.
Now where's my tape box?
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