As this site’s resident gadget geek, I loves me some buttons (see my paeans to Apple CarPlay and autonomous cars for just two examples). However, I think this dashboard (that I photographed at a recent car show) is too much even for me. With no fewer than 38 buttons, four knobs and one D-pad, it looks like a computer factory exploded nearby. And yet with all these buttons, it still manages to have the deadly sin of a panel blank as well.
Let’s see if you’re button-fu is as strong as mine, and if you can identify the unfortunate vehicle to which all these buttons belong.
Is it an Opel Astra ? Or a Buick ?
Buick, for sure.
I know exactly what make and model of car this is, but as a contributor to this site I think its a bit unfair for me to reveal that information. All I’ll say is that I had to use one for a three hour trip a couple of years back and overall they’re very nice cars. Excellent highway cruisers. Unfortunately the infotainment system was quite cumbersome, and the button on the shifter you need to press to change gears resides in an area so small that its easy to pinch yourself when doing so.
The temperatures in Fahrenheit would probably point to a Buick Verano, the Opel Astra’s American cousin.
I think it’s a pre 2015 Buick Regal also known as the Opel or Vauxhall Insignia.
Pre 2014.
all those cars are the Opel Insignia, the other two are just it’s corporate clones. BTW Opel owns Vauxhall.
Buick Cascada.
Sorry, but I calls them like I sees them!
Lots of buttons to be sure! I don’t think though it has many more than lots of other well equipped cars but because they are all lumped together it looks overwhelming. Often there are various clusters of buttons presented separately which is probably a better idea. I’m not sure having traction control in the same cluster as volume and infotainment is a very desirable.
Crash creation centre, distractions like this dont belong in cars.
You said it! I DETEST these miniaturized menaces to mankind. (please, excuse my excessive alliteration.)
There are a lot of old farts on the road nowadays and I am one of them. I wear bifocals. They work great to see the speedometer or change the radio station, but I could never hope to use this mess safely. How is this any different than texting?
You may need to make 1-2 button pushes on this center stack, once in awhile. They’re the same buttons every time so you’ll quickly learn where they are and what they do. If you do glance down at it, it’ll be for just a moment to confirm you’re aiming for the button you think you are.
Texting is dozens of keystrokes, usually on a small touchscreen where it’s hard to hit the right one, and where even if you are scanning between road and screen, you’re taking your attention away from driving for likely minutes at a time while you consider the message and your response, let alone the actual typing.
There’s no comparison.
You are correct that you will not often need to use the buttons, but since this is for NAV as well, you will have to use them occasionally. However, you are not supposed to program the NAV while in motion, so no worries there, right? And, at least they are buttons, big and legible, rather than a touch screen that one cannot read and does not work as expected. That is just another reason old farts (like me) still love Buick. If you have to get the gadgets, at least let me try to use them….
Voice controls have really come a long way, and are easy to use with a little practice. In fact, I’ve found Android Auto to be so good that I didn’t bother getting the touchscreen system in my new car. I just mount my phone on the dash and say things like “play song __” or “navigate to ___” which can be anything from a name in my contact list to the name of a town or point of interest. Or–and this is really handy–the most recent place I looked up on Google Maps before I got in the car.
I have some privacy concerns with all this, but it does really cut down on fiddling with buttons and menus while driving.
Yeah, voice command is great. A couple weeks ago, it attempted to send me to Coopersville, Pennsylvania instead of Cooperstown, New York. It once caused a panic, by turning a text “gonna be at the mall?” to “gunman be at the mall.”
Memorably, it once sent me, instead of Kay’s Package, to K’s strip club.
At least you can still adjust the volume without staring at half a dozen touchscreen menus.
No idea on the source, but it looks like a better interface for a desktop website than for a car’s dash controls. I think I like Bryce’s characterization of Crash Creation Centre. Or maybe Distraction Enhancement Console (DEC).
The problem being that the customer expects all those bells and whistles – and you’ve got to control them somehow.
Until we can come up with a chip implanted at the base of our neck, amplifying our thought processes for the car to read, we’re stuck with one of two input methods: buttons/knobs or touchscreens. And if you want them to be simple, then you have to give up the heated seats, lane creep avoidance, etc., etc., etc.
I feel safe in assuming that those of us who actually want cars to revert to manual transmissions, crank windows, AM only radios, are a very vocal minority. Besides, if we got the neural implants up and working, this crowd would start screaming about “invasion of privacy” amongst other things.
I am baffled in that I cannot tell you which vehicle and in that I would not know how to work with this confusing panel while trying to keep my eyes on the road. So, which manufacturer dreamt of this thing?
Opel.
Pre-2014 Insignia/Regal
Wrong. Buick Cascada
No idea in what car it is.
Still outnumbered by the center console in the Citroën C6 though…
Buick Verano for sure
How many times do I have to tell you guys, it’s a Buick Cascada! Period.
Brad, how about a Ford Fusion?
Both the Verano and Cascada have a similar center stack setup. Actually one of our contributors, yohai71, owned an Astra from which the Verano was based off, and on his COAL you can see a similar center stack… It can be a Cascada but it can also be a Verano…
True. I didn’t feel it was appropriate to participate having known the answer already…
Although, (hint) I do not think it’s the Astra or Verano.
No wonder why people get distracted while driving…
Gotta be GM, nobody overdoes buttons like they do
OK. I did a ton of metallurgical forensics in my former life (retired). This pic was taken with ambient lighting. No flash. Note where the light was originating from. ABOVE and BEHIND! The top was down!
Without knowing for sure, but just looking at the mass of buttons, I agree with several others. Something designed by Opel, including the Opel sourced Buicks. I looked at a Cascada at the Detroit show a couple years ago and was appalled at the number of buttons on the center stack. I have looked over a few Opel designed and built Saturn Astras of 9 years ago and found another ergonomic disaster.
How is it that the same national culture that leads to the creation of the simple, straightforward, controls in a VW, also produces these disasters in Russelsheim? It isn’t just the switchgear either. Ever try to replace a headlight bulb in an Astra H? It’s a snap in a Mk V Golf. but a nightmare of near Fiat proportions in the Astra.
You would think that a culture that favors order would create order everywhere, while a culture that favors chaos would create chaos everywhere. What’s wrong with Russelsheim?
Tom Halter is reading all of these comments, laughing his ass off as we type!
“How is it that the same national culture that leads to the creation of the simple, straightforward, controls in a VW, also produces these disasters in Russelsheim?” I’ll bet it’s an edict from Detroit marketing morons, that more buttons are better.
Back in the 1980s and 1990s my dad worked for one of the appliance suppliers to the Sears Kenmore brand. He developed the control panels for high-end ovens. Dad’s design just had one knob, one display and a few buttons to do everything. Push the temperature button and turn the knob to set the temperature. Push the timer button and turn the knob to set the time, etc. Simple, clear and easy.
The buyers at Sears hated it. They insisted on lots of buttons, cover the whole panel with buttons, because that’s what they thought was “high-end”. No knobs! Knobs were “obsolete”. Who cares if it’s a nightmare to figure out, maybe not even safe, the customer won’t find that out until after the sale. Marketing morons.
Now it’s pictures of buttons on a screen. Even worse!
Yeah, but you don’t have to drive an oven!
Turn on the defroster
Eeny, meeny, miney…moe
I’ll bet it’s an edict from Detroit marketing morons, that more buttons are better.
Could be. Thinking that people will see all the buttons and think the car is “high tech”? In the late 80s I had a couple in my Radio Shack looking at a rack stereo system. The most important thing to them was how many buttons it had, and if the buttons lit up.
Fisher introduced a rack stereo/VCR/TV combination around that same time. This was the remote for it.
Ford product, but unsure which one. I’ll guess Fusion.
Both the Cascada and Verano have the same setup that looks like this.
Anyway I thought you all like buttons instead of screens.
No they don’t.
ah yes I see that there is a button missing from one.
I’m actually agreeing that you are right.
My worst nightmare.
Reason to hate newer cars.
Seriously. So far I have not had any anxiety dreams that involved the seven inch touch screen driver distraction device that my recent rental Dodge Journey was equipped with. Squeeze the wheel at 9&3 and all kinds of fun things happen!
Give me a radio with two knobs and five pushbutton presets, “Climate control” with two sliders and a fan switch, pull out switches for lights and wipers, three pedals and a stick and I’m happy. Wind up windows are ok by me also.
Ars Technica, a very popular site for the techno-savvy, reviewed the Buick Cascada last year. In case you think computer geeks like lots of buttons, here’s what they had to say: “What’s worse is that GM also skimped where it’s most visible to owners: inside. The interior design crew coughed up dozens of buttons and dials (we stopped counting at 40) for the center stack’s ventilation, audio, and ancillary adjustments you deal with everyday.”
Really? Can anyone see my posts? I have a 2016 Buick Regal 2.0 Turbo. They cleaned up the button nightmare in MY 2014. I drove a Cascada, and it was pretty cool, but slow, and the button nightmare was the part of the reason I didn’t buy it.
I have a 2016 Buick Regal 2.0 Turbo. They cleaned up the button nightmare in MY 2014.
Did they really clean it up, or move the buttons to the in-dash video game?
LOL!
What a monstrosity. If I was shopping and saw that, I’d leave the dealership and scout another brand.
This is my Nissan’s control panel, so much simpler!! And yet it does the same basic things.
For just a moment, I read that button on the upper right as a FAX button. Paper probably goes in the CD slot.
I cheated and did a Google image search, so my answer doesn’t count. But looking at all the results, it makes me long for the classic cars of old and their art deco dashboards or English walnut and toggle switch gear.
As as the site minimalist. I’ll take the Tesla Model S: 2 buttons, one opens the glove box, the other the emergency flashers.
Dave
Where’s the belly button?
And does it really have enough buttons?
Actually, here’s something that does have enough buttons, I think:
Holy Keith Emerson!!!
Those “buttons” are called “stops” on such a pipe organ, as they were originally pull out levers. When you wanted to use all the pipes for the most sound, you opened them all, thus the term “pulling out all the stops”.
Huh. I’m always learning new things here, often when I least expect it. 🙂
Some Buick, Vauxhall, or Opel
It’s from a vehicle I won’t be buying.
Definitely not a Fusion. I have a 2014 and my daughter has a 2017 and neither looks like this.
I’m not sure what it is but am glad that Alfa 164 owners who have mastered its dashboard now have a new challenge.
I also thought of the 164 when I saw this.
I’ll take the original Mini MK I with “cyclops” instrument gauge, “magic wand” shifter (maybe 18 inches long rising from a flat floor), and floor-mounted starter button.
The cyclops gauge allowed them to put the bus-sized steering wheel on either the right or left.
Austin, Morris, Riley Elf …….. any badge-engineered variety.
Some years ago, I had a rental car—I think it was a Nissan—apparently equipped with a bidirectional pushbutton cat folder. Never did figure out how to use it, but just recently I found a pic on the internet; evidently pushing the button folds (or unfolds?) a cat, somewhere.
This will be a NHTSA requirement for all cars starting in the 2020 model year. Any cat (or other small mammal) hiding underneath or within the wheel wells of a car will be automatically folded until the car moves forward or backward 10 ft., after which time the cat will unfold. This is said to reduce under-car cat deaths by 67%.
Back in my childhood days there was a group of semi-feral cats that hung out around my grandparents’ house. My grandfather would throw out food for them, something that earned him scorn from my grandmother, who despised cats. My siblings and I would attempt to pet the cats from time to time but they were too wary for us and they would run off whenever we approached them. In cold weather the cats would climb up onto the front tires of the car, presumably because it was warm and cozy from the engine heat. When the car was started you would see several cats come flying out from beneath the vehicle; the animals were at least smart enough to exit to the rear and avoid the fan. Occasionally a slow cat would panic, dig his claws into the tire and find himself squashed before he could get loose. I presume that my grandfather would then have to go out and deal with the remains.
That kind of tragedy could’ve been avoided by doing a cat scan before starting the car.
I was just telling my wife our next car needs a cat folder. We don’t even have a cat.
If you cannot afford a cat, one will be provided. Please select Calico, Tortie, Tabby, Persian, Siamese or Turkish Van.
I concede that this is a Buick Cascada and not a Verano. This one looks like it has ticked all the options like a navigation system, steering wheel warmer, traction control, butt warmers for both seats, lane departure warning, rear parking sensor, and dual zone climate control. I don’t know what FAV and AS are, but I think they’re related to the audio system. I agree with the button overload, but where else would the buttons for these options be placed?
I would eliminate the redundant temperature setting knob and instead use a single knob and a switch to alternate between driver and passenger temperatures. I would also use rotary knobs for the fan speed and air vent selector. Looking at the air vent setting buttons in the bottom center, it seems like you can’t select air blowing simultaneously at your face and feet, or perhaps pushing both the down arrow and horizontal arrow button enables air to blow in both at your face and feet? I find it odd that the power door lock button is located in the top center of the console.
When modern cars offer these many features, thus inviting distracted driving, it helps rationalize self driving cars.
So one question remains: what is the missing button that would take the place of the panel blank? My pet theory is that there is no extra button, the designers just couldn’t come up with another way to make it symmetrical. More boringly, it could also be the equivalent of an expansion slot, saving space for some future button yet to be devised.
I knew buying that old Chrysler was a bad idea but I couldn’t resist…
But after parking beside my brand new (insert brand here) I decided the simple easy to operate dash made it the best idea I ever had and will drive it for the rest of my days
THE END!?
GM ruined Opel and foisted them off to the French. Ugh, as an ardent Opel fan this is heartbreaking. My daily driver Kadett B has two sliders and a rocker switch for the climate control, Radio delete, 1 rocker switch for the parking lights and another for the headlights . A fancy red rocker for the 4 ways. One last 3 position rocker for the wipers. Dumb phone goes in the pocket and stays there. Thats it, no distracted driving here. Beautifully simple and functional along with reliable. Computers belong on the desktop, not in my car. It simply is not polite for one to Google in public.
As much of a mess as this is, I still prefer it to a touch screen.
Give me that car for a week, and my right hand will know where all the frequently used buttons are without looking.
I think that the buttons only bring up a touch screen or at least some of them do.
This parking meter in Paris has around 60 buttons. Takes longer to figure out how to use it than it does to run your errand.
Wow, here’s a Chicago one. Only six buttons but probably hated just as much.
It could be the Buick Cascada, which is essentially a Verano cabriolet and which still uses that center stack.
GM’s newer wares (’16+ Cruze, ’17 LaCrosse, Envision, ’17 Equinox, XT5, ’16 Camaro, CT6, ’17 Acadia, etc) continue to use the same basic electronics architecture, but have simplified controls.
Remember the fuss when the ‘oval’ Taurus first came out, with the heater controls integrated with the same control panel as the sound system? Car and Driver called it a knee in the groin for the aftermarket sound industry. Now look what they’re doing!
It wasn’t just that the stereo and HVAC controls were integrated in a single panel; the actual stereo components were mounted away from the ICP in the trunk.
That was only the beginning! I worked at an aftermarket stereo/tint shop in the early 00s that did a lot of work for the local Buick-Pontiac-GMC store. There I learned that ’99-05 Grand Am stereos were “multiplexed” into the car, with several other vehicle functions integrated into them.
Simply yanking out the OEM head unit and dropping in an aftermarket radio would lead to numerous warning lights. Remedying this issue required the installer to either a) taking the time to carefully rewire each connection to keep the car happy, or b) keeping the OEM radio plugged in and strapped down against a hidden dash brace, and running a separate power feed to the aftermarket deck.
Guess which method we used most often?
I remember reading that article!
I don’t care how many buttons there are. It’s not complete if it doesn’t have this.
As Swedishbrick commented above, this center console is all too familiar to me:
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/cars-of-a-lifetime/coal-opel-astra-j-2012-on-the-way-up/
This is why I didn’t want to participate in this quiz. But now that some commenters discovered the answer, I will add that it’s not an Astra…
Wow. That’s a lot of buttons. Still, at least GM made an effort to differentiate them by size and shape. If you go back to the late 80s Olds Toronado without the VIC screen option, they used tons of identical gray buttons to operate the audio and climate controls. Consumer Reports had a picture and button count in their review. They talked about having to memorize what row and column buttons were in so they did not have to take their eyes off the road to change the radio volume, for example. Anyone got a picture of that car’s interior?
Also, four knobs is really not so bad, my ’14 Malibu had the same four for volume, tuning/track, driver temperature and passenger temperature, they were just laid out better in that car so it did not look so cluttered.
I found it and scanned it – 42 buttons! (That’s for the climate control, radio and tape deck, not including the six additional buttons for the trip computer.) Here’s the part of the review where they panned the Toronado’s panopoly of buttons and the Buick Riviera’s GCC.
After the tenth or so comment mentioning the Buick Cascada, I had to assume that was not a typo. How is that pronounced … Casc-AY-da, Casc-AH-da, perhaps CASC-uh-duh? I think I’ve heard of this car, though I’m not sure I’ve ever seen one, but my eyes always read the name as Cascadia. A good garage mate for a Tacoma, or perhaps a Denali. As for the button mess, as someone with poor visual proprioception (I have to look at the keyboard/keypad to type or dial a phone) I have really come to appreciate steering wheel buttons after owning a 2nd gen Prius and now a 3rd gen Tacoma. Space limits the sheer number of buttons to memorize, and the left thumb and right thumb separation is much easier for me to handle than a massive array of buttons on a center stack, right hand only.
Cas–CAH-da.
That reminded me of a Car and Driver article on Aston Martin Lagonda when it was released in 1976. The writer mentioned about too many LED gauges in the dashboard, making it hard to focus on the driving. Not to mention too many buttons on the control panel, too, that weren’t tactile at all.
The representative pointed out one button to switch all LED except speedometer and fuel gauge off. The writer declared something about driving a Chevrolet Nova, which didn’t please the representative.
During the 1970s and 1980s, the German manufacturers made a huge showcase of driver’s ergonomics. They emphasised greatly on the tactical ability to intuitively find the specific control button or knob without taking their eyes off the road. Yet, their idea of driver’s ergonomics seemed to go down the hill as more and more technological advancements progressed.
Seeing pics of the Astra center stack have shown some differences… Now I’m sure it’s a Cascada
That crap really makes me appreciate my Crown Vic. Three twist knobs for the climate control, one for the rear defrost, and maybe 6 or 8 one the radio. That’s it. No need to read a 350 page manual to figure out how to use ’em!
I used to own a 1985 VW GTI which was, in my estimation, a perfect automobile. My GTI had the best ergonomics of any car that I ever owned. The instrument panel was simple, straight forward, extremely functional and attractive.
My 1992 Honda Accord also had a very well laid out instrument panel, but not as ergonomically perfect as my GTI.
The absurd button trend seemed to have started with those ugly late 80’s-90’s Pontiac interiors that had a plethora of push buttons on the steering wheel hubs. The Pontiac 6000 STE and Grand Prix mostly comes to mind with the Atari inspired digital instrumentation.
Nowadays we have cars and trucks with extremely high quality interiors (even a handful of GM cars actually have acceptable interiors for the first time ever) but the instrument panels on today’s cars and many trucks have become driver distracting busy boxes!