I now have my F-type for 6 weeks, and love it overall. But I find that I am rather annoyed by several of the bells and whistles that Jaguar has chosen to bestow on me (and obviously I pay for in some way, both in the cost of the car and some modest amount of extra weight):
- The air vent that goes up and down is silly. It is always up if the climate control is on and the car is running, and there is no advantage to having it down at other times. Passengers often ask me what is the point of it and I am at a loss. It has no coolness factor unless it has some purpose, and it clearly adds both cost and weight. Plus it has the potential of becoming a maintenance problem as the car gets older.
- The "ambient lighting" is actually just the light around the inside door handles. I do not need this light to have a choice of four colors and four brightness levels - it serves no benefit, and clearly cost engineering effort and probably adds some minor amount to the cost of the car. It certainly doesn't justify requiring a whole screen in the setup menu to control it.
- "Stealth mode" just dims the interior lights. There are other controls that do the same thing. Who needs it? I could see something with this name that dropped the car's sound output down to the level of ordinary cars. I doubt I would use that either, but at least it would have a purpose.
I would happily give all this stuff back in exchange for anything useful - perhaps voice control like you get on a $15000 Ford?
- The air vent that goes up and down is silly. It is always up if the climate control is on and the car is running, and there is no advantage to having it down at other times. Passengers often ask me what is the point of it and I am at a loss. It has no coolness factor unless it has some purpose, and it clearly adds both cost and weight. Plus it has the potential of becoming a maintenance problem as the car gets older.
- The "ambient lighting" is actually just the light around the inside door handles. I do not need this light to have a choice of four colors and four brightness levels - it serves no benefit, and clearly cost engineering effort and probably adds some minor amount to the cost of the car. It certainly doesn't justify requiring a whole screen in the setup menu to control it.
- "Stealth mode" just dims the interior lights. There are other controls that do the same thing. Who needs it? I could see something with this name that dropped the car's sound output down to the level of ordinary cars. I doubt I would use that either, but at least it would have a purpose.
I would happily give all this stuff back in exchange for anything useful - perhaps voice control like you get on a $15000 Ford?
