Cancelling my Pre-order, thoughts inside from test drive

[Pablolibre]

I'm going to make this post a list of all the things that led to my decision to cancel my pre-order. Hopefully this information will be read by someone who can use the information to make a better product in the future! My whole investigation into the Rivian software/hardware has essentially been a good-faith investigation into the brand.

I ended up getting a Model Y Juniper instead. I'm going to put ScreenMate into it for CarPlay/AA. If you're like me and want CarPlay/AA, EVPlay should eventually make a module for the R2; they already have an upgrade kit for the R1 models.

• Above all, the lack of CarPlay/Android Auto is the biggest factor in my decision to cancel. The Rivian software is not better than CarPlay, and based on the other posts that I've read spanning years of Rivian software developments, I can comfortably say at this point that the speed of software iteration at Rivian is not confidence-inspiring. I don't want to wait for the Rivian software to "maybe someday" duplicate all the functions already present in CarPlay, when I can simply just use CarPlay right now. Below I'll list things that I cannot duplicate from CarPlay/AA within the Rivian software ecosystem:
  • HomeKit support for accessories (and Google/Alexa integrations on the Android side), especially a garage door opener. Granted, Rivian has the best implementation of this in their software because they emulate an old radio frequency based dumb-opener, but I need this functionality on day 1, at no charge.
  • Waze. I want the mapping software to have a social element to it. Waze essentially is a democratic service that allows for alerts that would otherwise be illegal/gray area if integrated into major mapping apps like Google Maps. I want to know where the speed cameras are, where obstructions are, and I want to hear from other drivers what they think about local roads, whether that info is "politically correct" or not.
  • Apple Music, Apple Podcasts, or whatever music app I want. I don't want to rely on Rivian software building an app. I want to be able to use any media app at all times.
  • Apple Maps is simply better than Google Maps for navigation. I use both Apple Maps and Google Maps, and Apple's maps generally are the most performant, and look the most polished. The old days of Apple Maps leading you off a cliff into a lake have been passed over by almost a decade now.
  • Personal wallpapers. I don't want to look at a large scale cartoon drawing of the car I'm already driving in. It's a lot like flying an American flag in America. "You're in America, so no need to state the obvious." I want customization.
  • I don't want to be "advertised" the brand at every turn in the software. CarPlay/AA does a fantastic job removing the car branding so I can have my own personal customization to make the car feel like "mine".
  • I'm able to write my own apps and use them in CarPlay.
  • I want the UI to have Glass-like transparency throughout.
  • Siri/Gemini/Alexa is leagues more reliable than any other assistant I've used, especially with personal context.
  • I rely on on-screen tapbacks for messages while driving.
  • App based ETA/location sharing (not text message based)
• Lack of accessories compared to Teslas. Almost all of the hardware/software features that Tesla doesn't support can be added with aftermarket parts. CarPlay/AA, auto presenting doorhandles, LED lightbar customizations, Sunroof covers, extra physical knobs (thanks in part to the extensibility support offered by the Tesla infotainment software), driver display, etc. Tesla Accessories. To be fair, Rivian does have accessories too, but they're not nearly as powerful as the competition, because of the lack of volume sales, and support by Rivian corporate.
• Lack of a 19" wheel option with the Launch Edition. I want to be able to maximize range, and to do that I need the smallest, lightest possible wheel. I asked about buying a set of 19" wheels, and I was told not to bother doing so by the salesperson.
• The Rivian infotainment software features that will be missing at launch. Never ever buy a product predicated on the promise of future software features. Also, if these basic features from the R1 can't make it to the R2 by launch, it'll take even longer for software features to be released based on customer feedback on the R2.
  • Rivian Assistant
  • Camping Mode
  • Garage Door support
  • Climate Hold
  • Pet Mode
  • Gear Guard will be present but with limited functionality.
• The halo wheels were awful outside of vertical scrolling; I just couldn’t get left and right clicks to trigger. The software integration with them was awful and I found myself not immediately understanding when I could go left/right/forward/backwards in a menu. Pressing into the wheels and pressing behind the wheels felt better than left/right clicks, but I wanted them to feel like the middle click on a mouse, and absolutely didn't feel that in my hands-on.
  • Scrolling with the wheels felt better than excellent. Definitely the best scroll wheel I’ve ever used in any product, ever.
• The lack of 2 pedal driving (forward creep) was unbelievably disappointing.
  • people coming from an ICE car are going to be disappointed by the lack of 2 pedal driving. Parking into a tight garage is also way harder without a coasting feature.
• The sales rep straight up couldn’t answer any intermediate level questions, and just seemed in a rush to get back to his desk in the empty waiting room. Not super confidence-inspiring service. These vehicles that are software defined need a rep dedicated to all the particulars, because if I can't find something in the software with my 20 years of software development, a non-tech person would be just lost.
• Super disappointed that there’s no option to delete the sunroof. I’d much much much prefer to have a metal roof. Here in the southwest, having a sunroof that can't be covered up is a huge loss.
  • besides the obvious heat-issues, getting a crack is a giant pane of glass on the roof is just not something I want to be possible. Here in the southwest, rocks fly at you all the time, and glass coverage isn't free anymore like it used to be with insurance.
• Autonomy+ issues
  • I couldn't get the car to switch lanes autonomously on my test drive (on excellent surface streets; I didn't have time to get on the highway to test it there)
  • I couldn't find an auto park function. I had to park the vehicle manually when I returned to the service center.
• Cruise control/driving dynamics
  • I really liked being able to set a speed in the cruise control with the +1 and +5 increments, but my Prius/Rav4 did a better job of that with the single pull down/push up for incremental speed changes in cruise control speed. The knobs method on the R2 felt worse from a UX perspective.
  • The brake regen felt like I was hard braking even with the lightest and most careful manipulation of the accelerator pedal. I simply couldn't come to a clean, limo-like stop like I can in my Lightning (which has 2 pedal, coasting mode enabled)
• The color choices were just awful. I wanted more bold color choices besides Catalina Cove and Borealis. Ideally, I'd want a watermelon green, but that's just me.
  • since these cars are made to order, there shouldn't be an issue with custom color selection if they're hand painted anyway
  • give me an RGB slider to customize the paint to whatever I want in the configurator (I'd be willing to pay extra for this)

Thanks for your opinion. As much as I would like the R2, I think I may ultimately get the iX3. I'll still have access to my wife's Subaru Forester Wilderness edition which meets 99.5% of my needs to get to remote places. Maybe in a few years in the future Rivian will have a service center in my state, become much more reliable and have better range in a vehicle this size. No shame in trying to make it work with an American company that I hope succeeds longterm.

Sponsored

 

[MaskedRacerX]

It's almost as if Carplay and crappy software go hand in hand...

Nah. The BMW native stack is solid, the ADAS is terrific, things like auto-backup-trace, parking assist, traffic creep, AR overlay for directions, etc.

But CarPlay (or any screen projection solution) is a stellar enhancement on top of it (not intended as a complete replacement). Apps get updated quicker and have more feature parity to their smartphone counterpart. Apps without any native version are available (dozens of music streaming services, proper group messaging, Waze, R8), and something that's a nice benefit: if you own multiple vehicles, you get a consistent UI across your rides for media, communication, home automation, etc.

Speaking of R8, I yapped about it in another thread, CarPlay released, very slick, done via an Apple Maps overlay!

It wouldn't be a total deal breaker for me for an R2, or any Rivian, but in my experience, having had it, and then not (in a Tesla), and then having it again, I do prefer to have it.

 

[Luke42]

Full self drive is not adaptive cruise control and lane keep. It will literally drive you everywhere and its un-freaking believable. Its so far ahead of everything else on the market, anyone that wants autonomy now has no other options. I can understand people buying a Tesla for the autonomy. Rivian is just not credible right now in this. Don't buy a Rivian hoping for Autonomy as we don't know how they will fare in this. Tesla made giant strides in Autonomy when they were HUGELY profitable and threw unlimited resources at it. Rivan's burning cash left and right and still hasn't reached profitability in any vehicle they sell.

I had some pretty bad experiences with FSD.

The only thing that was unbelievable about it was that such poor software was released to the public.

 

[Great Gatsby]

Nah. The BMW native stack is solid, the ADAS is terrific, things like auto-backup-trace, parking assist, traffic creep, AR overlay for directions, etc.

But CarPlay (or any screen projection solution) is a stellar enhancement on top of it (not intended as a complete replacement). Apps get updated quicker and have more feature parity to their smartphone counterpart. Apps without any native version are available (dozens of music streaming services, proper group messaging, Waze, R8), and something that's a nice benefit: if you own multiple vehicles, you get a consistent UI across your rides for media, communication, home automation, etc.

Speaking of R8, I yapped about it in another thread, CarPlay released, very slick, done via an Apple Maps overlay!

It wouldn't be a total deal breaker for me for an R2, or any Rivian, but in my experience, having had it, and then not (in a Tesla), and then having it again, I do prefer to have it.

My BMW is from 2018, so my experience is a little different. Very basic idrive setup with Carplay that I had to pay $200 for since it was an add on that only took up half of a 8 inch screen and then had to a third party to code it to full screen. In other words, experience with software on old BMW hasn't been great. Hit or miss when Carplay will work as well.

Glad they have figured it out on their new vehicles. Have a lot of hope for the iX3 and its new software. I've seen the i4 and i5 and while things seemed to work, they have like 10,000 menus on the screen. They really need to simplify that!

 

[Apprunner]

I had some pretty bad experiences with FSD.

The only thing that was unbelievable about it was that such poor software was released to the public.

Understandable. It only got really really good recently and you have to have HW4 which is only in the newer cars. I was a skeptic until I used it with my free trial. Really amazing now but honestly, its not for me because I love to drive. I would take an R2 with poor autonomy over Model Y.

 

[freshpow]

Nah. The BMW native stack is solid, the ADAS is terrific, things like auto-backup-trace, parking assist, traffic creep, AR overlay for directions, etc.

But CarPlay (or any screen projection solution) is a stellar enhancement on top of it (not intended as a complete replacement). Apps get updated quicker and have more feature parity to their smartphone counterpart. Apps without any native version are available (dozens of music streaming services, proper group messaging, Waze, R8), and something that's a nice benefit: if you own multiple vehicles, you get a consistent UI across your rides for media, communication, home automation, etc.

Speaking of R8, I yapped about it in another thread, CarPlay released, very slick, done via an Apple Maps overlay!

It wouldn't be a total deal breaker for me for an R2, or any Rivian, but in my experience, having had it, and then not (in a Tesla), and then having it again, I do prefer to have it.

As an R8 owner myself, I'm struggling to see the draw of the overlay vs. just displaying on the unit itself. The head unit still has to sit there and it's actually much easier to quickly glance at the unit and read the signal/direction than it is to try to find it on that overlay (maybe because I'm colorblind?).

 

[MaskedRacerX]

As an R8 owner myself, I'm struggling to see the draw of the overlay vs. just displaying on the unit itself. The head unit still has to sit there and it's actually much easier to quickly glance at the unit and read the signal/direction than it is to try to find it on that overlay (maybe because I'm colorblind?).

R8 Companion adds significantly better detection, adjustments, collaborative DBs of "hot" areas, TLCs, vastly improves false positives, has much better audio warnings. It's not really about the map, or just being a "remote display."

However, to the latter point, if you mount your detector up high where it's much less visible to your typical LOS, it's easier to look at the center display - or even your phone if you have a good mount solution. Plus, it let's you run your detector in "dark mode".

This is the "classic" display from the iPhone when connected:

 

[Luke42]

Understandable. It only got really really good recently and you have to have HW4 which is only in the newer cars. I was a skeptic until I used it with my free trial. Really amazing now but honestly, its not for me because I love to drive. I would take an R2 with poor autonomy over Model Y.

That’s what the Tesla fanboys say every year, though, for every major release of FSD since v10.

I’ve had this conversation every year for four years.

I’m out.

 

[mkennedy009]

I appreciate and listen to the OP's posts. He is able to clearly articulate his thoughts and reason through logic. Also, my momma said if I do not have anything nice to say then keep quiet.

I am not convinced Rivian will make it as a company. They have to appeal to a larger audience, like me and the OP.

 

[slillie]

I find it very interesting how many members here don’t own a Rivian, yet are seemingly experts on them. This is fun.

 

[Great Gatsby]

I find it very interesting how many members here don’t own a Rivian, yet are seemingly experts on them. This is fun.

New to the internet?

 

[slillie]

New to the internet?

Apparantly so. LOL

Sponsored