The "driver score" feature sounds like a solution for the worried parent whose kid occasionally borrows the car in the evenings and on weekends. I wonder if they plan on entering this market.
Automatic: Your Smart Driving Assistant
191–200 of 305 posts
Re: Automatic: Your Smart Driving Assistant
#192On the pre-order page, it says only the iPhone 5 and 4S are supported. Why isn't 4 supported? I have an iPad mini with LTE as my only mobile device, is there any reason Automatic wouldn't work with it? I'm ok with it running in a smaller window (the way iPhone-only apps run on iPads). It also asks you to pick a car. Is that just to verify that it'll be compatible? I mean, is there anything stopping me from changing w…
It's probably using Bluetooth Low Energy, which is not available on the iPhone 4. The iPad mini should work, but its obviously up to automatic whether they build an iPad app.
Re: Automatic: Your Smart Driving Assistant
#193[deleted]
Re: Automatic: Your Smart Driving Assistant
#194I've seen these before. There are several companies working on similar products (and things like HUDs you can get off of eBay which show you OBD-II information). The main problem with these (all of them!) is that the OBD II was never designed to be used like this. It will run the device 24/7 even when the car is turned off. So it will run down your battery in a similar way to leaving the cabin light on would do... No…
Drop an amp meter between the ground cable and your battery's negative terminal (after disconnecting that connection, of course), and you'll probably see and existing, full time current draw (while the vehicle is off and parked) in any modern vehicle well above what an odb dongle will use.
Re: Automatic: Your Smart Driving Assistant
#195Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think it's better to break this down, because this myth of 'running out of battery' is really exaggerated Let's say your average battery has 40AH. That means it can provide 1A for 40h (or better, the product time(h) x current(A) = 40 for a charged battery) @ 12v If your lamps consume 24W (I'm guessing), that's 2A, it means it would go from fully charget to nothing in 20h. But of course, your battery is usually not…
I wouldn't call it a myth people have reported issues with similar port adapters, particularly bluetooth ones. If the issue doesn't apply here then great but in general people should pay attention.
My cheap chinese bluetooth obd2 device caused my battery to drain when I was ill for a week and didn't use my car over the christmas holidays. On the plus side now I know how to jump start it.
Re: Automatic: Your Smart Driving Assistant
#196Does this interact with door locks and car alarms at all? Is that even possible? At least once a week I find myself walking back to my car to make sure I hit the car alarm. I would definitely pay to solve that problem. Getting an iPhone app for my home security system has already saved me a lot of grief.
That would be a really nice feature in this for anyone who doesn't like/want onstar.
Re: Automatic: Your Smart Driving Assistant
#197So it's a $10 elm327 ? http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=elm327&_sacat=0 With a Torque clone? https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.prowl.torq...
Thanks for those links. I'm tempted to buy one to experiment. Torque says it allows you to upload data to your own website too, which means you could use it with Tasker to do probably much more than the Automatic can do.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.dinglisch....
Re: Automatic: Your Smart Driving Assistant
#198Wow, this could be really cool if you collected all the data from the cars anonymously and then built a data-set that mapped common car issues to mileage for specific makes/models/year combos. That could really improve car performance by predicting when issues will arise and warning the user (my 2002 malibu had a switch fail at 92k which is a common thing once I looked online, but this lead to more issues when it failed and may have been prevented if I'd replaced the part earlier).
This tool seems like a great idea. I'm going to get one when the android version is released.
Re: Automatic: Your Smart Driving Assistant
#199Earlier quoted context omitted.
We're paranoid about not running your car's battery down. When the ignition is off, we consume less than 1 mA. By itself, the Automatic Link would take 3-4 years to drain even a cheap battery.
I think it's better to break this down, because this myth of 'running out of battery' is really exaggerated Let's say your average battery has 40AH. That means it can provide 1A for 40h (or better, the product time(h) x current(A) = 40 for a charged battery) @ 12v If your lamps consume 24W (I'm guessing), that's 2A, it means it would go from fully charget to nothing in 20h. But of course, your battery is usually not…
Car batteries don't die after sitting idle for three weeks, not in a normal car with a working battery.
At 1mA of current draw, this device is definitely not a problem. But the idea that an unpowered car uses enough power to drain the battery in less than a month is clearly ridiculous.
Re: Automatic: Your Smart Driving Assistant
#200I am really excited about this product, but had a couple of questions:
1. Will this be able to connect to more than one phone without significant reconfigurations? My wife and I own one car. It would be great to swap which phone to connect to depending on who is driving.
2. Will this need a tethering plan (or a jailbreak) for Automatic to use my iPhone's data plan? Since AT&T/Verizon charge extra for a tethering plan, even if you have a fixed data plan, that's an extra expense that you should mention in your FAQs.