|
From YourSITE.com Miscellaneous Features I’m a few minutes early for my meeting at the bar of the hotel in the center of Valencia Spain that Audi has commandeered for its launch of the new Q5. No matter, Filip Brabec is already there and already waiting. As I’ve come to know him, that’s the nature of Brabec. His very appearance is always stylish and consistent – never-wrinkled shirt, tailored suit, the Breitling Navitimer… this might be his casual day - after all, he’s in a courtyard bar in a hotel in sunny Valencia.
Fourtitude: Will you walk us through the basic changes between the second generation to the third generation of MMI? Filip Brabec: The biggest revolution probably happened in the navigation portion of the system - the fact that you now have a hard drive. It is a 40 GB hard drive, part of which is used for the navigation data. The navigation data is also much more extended so we have many more points of interest. We also have better categorizations of the points of interest than we had before so now you can look for coffee shops separate from restaurants. 4T: Now that it is hard drive based. Is that something that can be updated? Brabec: Yes. We are definitely going to have an update possibility. It is likely to result through a dealer. We don’t believe that it is ready for a consumer-type of update but it is definitely okay for a dealer update. So that is also part of the advantage of having a hard drive. The second major change is the screen itself and the graphics delivered. We are the first ones to use an automotive grade NVIDIA chip for graphics processing which makes it a lot faster. We use this for the graphics quality and the processing speed of the zoom-in and zoom-out functionality so you have a true 3-D topographic map of the whole US and the buildings in the cities where available. The 3D map also works together with the traffic because you do not want to keep flipping back and forth if you have traffic. The traffic manifests itself in two ways. One is a green, yellow or red display along all major highways. You will have a warning of slow moving traffic, fast moving traffic type of thing, similar to what you see on traffic.com. Then you have incident information, meaning you have display of the incidents on the map. You also have them displayed along your route. They are differentiated whether they are on your route or not and you also have an "info button". Now your "info button" is a "traffic button". When you push it, it will display the incidents. The system differentiates between incidents that are along the route and the ones that are not. Then you can scroll through the incidents and click on any of them, to get more detail. This traffic data is fed through Sirius. The third big change then comes in the voice recognition ability, which is vastly improved. You can enter destination now via voice recognition, you start by entering the country or city and go from there. You can now also search POI’s via voice rec. On top of that, the driver can now navigate to a stored name from phone book, such as George Achorn – so you can “navigate to George Achorn”. You no longer have to specially store such voice tag, you just do it.
Fourtitude: If you are going to give a voice command, is there any trigger phrase that you must say for it to recognize that you are going to give a voice command? Brabec: There is a beep and there is bar/icon on the bottom of the screen and in the driver info display that shows when you have to talk. It is pretty clear in giving you a prompt of when to talk, which is a key portion of the system particularly as you talk about a system that is a dialogue system not just a voice recognition system. You say one command and it does that one thing, it keeps talking back to you. "Do you mean this one or that one" and it gives you further choices. That is why it is very important in that kind of system to know exactly when you are suppose to talk. The other new functionality in the voice recognition is that there is a basic overlay of a few but very key commands that you can use cross functionally that you are not able to use on the current system. For example, today if you are in navigation and you say, "Call home" it will just cancel out because it only accepts navigation commands today. Now, there will be a basic overlay of commands that you will be able to use within any menu. Let's say you are in navigation and say, "call Peter" it will make the phone call. It is also improved for complimenting dialects. In the setup feature you have a "learning button". The system has you say a multitude of things and it learns how you pronounce them. The other big improvement of the voice recognition is that you now no longer have to create voice tags for your telephone entries. Your telephone book gets synced and let’s say that you have 200 phone numbers. You don’t have time to sit there all day and input 200 voice tags. We now have a true speech-to-text engine, so you are able to push a button and say, "Call George Achorn" and it will actually do that even though you didn’t input the number, so it is actually reading what you are saying. It is an English based system. That means that it is going to read mostly the English names. The system will also give you a choice to store a name tag to a name if you know that that name is difficult for the system to pronounce or that it is picking it up differently than you would pronounce it. In that case, you can always create your own voice tag. It is very easy and very simple. It prompts you to that right on the screen. Overall, the navigation and voice recognition areas have lot of improvements. I think that it is really enjoyable to have a clear and crisp screen that you just drive around with. It is just a pleasure and we will have things like branded Points of Interest. You will see points that are branded on the map, so you will see where there is Starbucks coffee or where there are Shell gasoline stations. Fourtitude: How do you decide what is branded and what is not? Brabec: We have a list of brands that we are allowed to use and that list will expand over time, meaning we will just add more to it as we go. It is not difficult for us to do that. Fourtitude: Is that an Audi thing or is that a Navteq thing? Brabec: We are using some data from Navteq and some logos we have in house, basically meaning that we have an agreement with a company that we can use their logo in our navigation system. Working with stopovers it is easier also. You can move stopovers up and down based on where they are. There are also some navigation, internal MMI improvements towards making it easier to use.
Fourtitude: You mentioned that you have the automotive grade video chip, what was used previously? Was it NVIDIA as well? Brabec: We didn’t really have a big graphics chip inside the thing that really processes big data because we didn’t need it all that much, but once you get into 3-D modeling it really becomes a big deal without wanting to have a jerky map that doesn’t move very quickly. Where it also manifests itself is in the DVD quality. That functionality manifests itself in the DVD quality. It has the crispest possible display. It is beautiful. Watching that and having a Bang & Olufsen system in the car it is really quite nice. If you play a DVD, you have the new roller inside and I guess that is another improvement - the mechanical portion of it, that you have the joystick on top of the turn knob, which moves you along the map. You can use it also in the DVD mode. If you are in a standstill and you put a normal movie DVD in, you can use that cursor for movie around the DVD menu. Fourtitude: Let's focus on the DVD if we can. First, on the video you can watch when the car is in park. At 0 miles per hour but the car can be in drive? Brabec: If you start driving it will do the typical TV thing, "Audio Only". It will block out the screen and say, "For your safety we deactivate the screen". Fourtitude: And that is immediately at 1 MPH? Brabec: It is pretty immediate. I just drove a car in LA and it has to be the first 5 MPH for sure because it is quick. The minute you start moving it is gone. But you also don’t expect people to really listen to a movie. This is more for a TV-type of market that you have to worry about that people watch TV while driving. If you are going to watch a movie you are probably going to be standing somewhere. 4T: That is the video side of it. Will it play DVD audio? Brabec: It will play some DVD audio. There are different types of DVD audio out there - different codings and it will play some of them. It will not play all of them. Now that takes us to the audio and the input area because the source list has become much bigger than we used to have. That is because you have SD cards now. Each unit in the front has that door opening that you can insert SD cards. That is one way to bring in music to the car and it will play MP3 as well as WMA, AAC and MP4. Fourtitude: iTunes files? Brabec: It will not play the proprietary iTunes file. That is not possible for anyone except iPod. It definitely plays WMA, AAC and also MP3 and MP4. That is the SD card part. Of course because you have a portition of the hard drive can be used for storing music so you have jukebox functionality inside the hard drive.
Fourtitude: You mentioned that the hard drive is 40GB. How much of that is for jukebox? Brabec: Approximately 12 to 15GB. Fourtitude: Is that space used for your phonebook as well? Brabec: Yes, but the phonebook is very tiny. The partition is roughly speaking 12GB or so for music because the databases for the maps are getting so big. Fourtitude: How do you put music on that hard drive? Will it rip it off the CD player? Brabec: This is a functionality that we are looking into. At the moment it will not rip the CD into an MP3 file. It will take an MP3 file and copy it to the hard drive. Forutitude: If it is on the SD? Brabec: From the SD or from a USB or you can bring a CD that has MP3 files on it . The only thing you can't do is music CD and rip it to the hard drive. Fourtitude: You can't convert? Brabec: Not at the moment but that is something that we are looking into. It is obviously a good level of functionality to have, the ability to store MP3 because so many times you just want to have it stored and you never touch it once it is in there. We wanted to make sure that there were multiple levels from which you could bring it in. You can bring it in through the CD player, through SD, or through USB. Just to finish the point about the Audi interface. It is integrated into the system so it no longer takes up the space. It is a little connector on the side in the glove box that you can connect the cable into. It takes about the same extensions as before so, AUX in, iPod, and a USB. And the USB then serves as a data input for a variety of things - one of which is basically a phonebook upload. As you go, you develop that phonebook nicely in your car, you can actually upload it into either an SD or into a USB stick and carry it into your next car. If you are turning your car in because of lease and you are buying a new one you store the data and put it into your new car. Fourtitude: Is that phonebook compatible with any contact management software currently like Windows or Apple? Brabec: Definitely, it's a V-card format. Fourtitude: If somebody is using Windows or an Apple I believe you can export as V- card. Brabec: Yes, V-card easily. As long as the device software really supports and creates the contacts in V-card format, it’s OK. After copying the data on the drive, the system verifies if the address can be found according to the database structure. Fourtitude: Your contact list is saved in V-Card format onto a USB jump drive hook it up to AMI and import it that way. Brabec: Of course, and, it will function both as a telephone storage and address storage. So if I have your home address I can call you or I can navigate to your home. That data is used universally throughout the MMI system.
Fourtitude: The current MMI can pull up a phonebook off of your device in most cases, can it import off of a device via Bluetooth off of a phone? Brabec: Yes, but I am not sure that I am getting at your question because that seems rather basic. You must be asking about something more involved. Fourtitude: Right now with the MMI I can access the phonebook on my blackberry but I can't save it to the car. Brabec: Ahh, yes that is definitely available. Fourtitude: So via Bluetooth you can save the contact list from the phone to the car. Brabec: Yes, into the MMI, absolutely. Fourtitude: How does one do that? Brabec: There is a upload function. You just push a button and it asks you whether you want to import one or all. There is an import function and it goes very quickly. It is the same way that it works with the music. You just go into memory and import and import all of the music into the car. It is quite simple to do. Fourtitude: Satellite radio? Brabec: Satellite radio will be standard. We have some new functionality in the satellite radio. That includes the bubble pop-up we already had on the later models. We had the pop-up that displays the whole song and the artist. In the new MMI we are also able to preview channels, which is very convenient. Iff you like satellite radio this is a very cool feature. You are driving, you are listening to Number One Hits and you want to know what is on Channel 4 but you don’t want to switch to channel 4, you scroll onto Channel 4 and there will be a bubble pop-up that will so you what is playing on Channel 4. Which is nice for those of us that like to channel surf. Fourtitude: HD? Brabec: Not at the moment, that is in discussion. Fourtitude: Can we jump back to navigation for a moment? One of the changes that I noticed is if you change the temperature in your heating or air conditioning. Instead of changing the screen entirely there is a split-screen. Brabec: There is a soft pop-up, which has see-through properties. That is for temperatures but it will also be for heated seats and things like that so you won’t have to get the full screen. Fourtitude: You won't lose the map? Brabec: Exactly.
Fourtitude: Split-screen is back for 3G. Brabec: It’s not exactly a split screen, but rather a display on one side of the map of the next 3 moves. And we also have, as you saw, a very easy way of operating it. There are a couple different ways to get to it. You can click on the voice recognition. It shows you on the side the next three turns. The other good thing is that it’s voice driven. A lot of time what happens to me, I drive a car with RNS-E, what happens to me is for a while I’d like to have the full view because I would like to see the full map because I am somewhere where I have to zoom out. It is very easy to make it go away. You do not have to search through set-up to make it go away. That is also a nice touch. Fourtitude: So you can hide splits screen? Brabec: Exactly. "splits-screen off, or splits screen on" are the commands.
Fourtitude: Are there any other interactive graphic changes to the way that it functions. We have covered the heating and temperature changes. We covered the split-screen. Brabec: We covered of course the joystick. So that it a big thing.
Fourtitude: How does the joystick interact? Brabec: Basically the functionality is really two-fold. It makes the map scrolling easier and it makes sense for the DVD menu mode. So those are the two modes where it is mostly used. Fourtitude: Does it work instead of the roller? If you are in iPod can you move it up and down in a playlist? Brabec: No. Fourtitude: It is still the traditional roller? Brabec: Yes. You know how it works today with scrolling along the map. It's more difficult because you have horizontal or vertical and you have to pick one and you have to keep going that way no matter. So right now you have the ability to go wherever you want on the map. You can use it to point at POI’s you want to navigate to. As you get to the POI you click on that and it will ask you, "Do you want to navigate to that POI?" "Sure" and off you go. Fourtitude: Can you pull address and even MP3 off of an iPod? I know my iPod has my full contact list on it and my calendar as well. Brabec: No, you cannot download music or contacts from iPod. Fourtitude: Are you ok? Brabec: Yes I am fine but I am considering I could ask someone very smart about it. (calls another guy) Yeah, no you can't. Fourtitude: Roll out. It debuts in Q5? Brabec: Yup and then we will roll it out into other models as we go. So upcoming model years is what I would say. Fourtitude: If I had to guess that your current product rotation, A6 facelift would probably get it. Brabec: A majority of the car lines will get it next year. Fourtitude: So 2010? Brabec: Yes. Fourtitude: Except A3, TT, and R8 which run the other system. Brabec: Yes, A3, TT, and R8 will not because they are not using that system. That is exactly right. But A4, A5, A6, Q7, all of those will be on the list together. Fourtitude: A8? Brabec: With A8 we are going to take a little different direction. This new system though is a cool product. I can't imagine how someone would want a car without it. I mean our navi rates have historically now 12-24 months grown in an amazing way. Fourtitude: We’ve been playing lately with the Garmin Nuvi, which has a touch screen. This feature seems to be coming more common. Has Audi considered a touch screen? Brabec: Considered, yes. There, we are also going to take a slightly different direction. That doesn’t mean that we are saying no to the entire idea of touch, but we are going to do something a little bit different and it is going to be in the not too distant future - not immediately in the first releases of 3G, but also in the not too distant future. Fourtitude: One of the things that I have noticed with the Garmin is that you can sync the thing with your computer. That is how you do your updates. It sounds like yours will be done at the dealership. One of the things that the Garmin allows you to do is upload sets of points of interest depending on your needs. I have seen everything from Starbucks to speed traps or known speed trap areas. Is that something that could be personalized? Or uploaded by a user who might create a data set, put it up online and other people might want to add that to their Audi. Brabec: Theoretically I think yes but not something that we specifically looked at. Interesting idea. Fourtitude: The speed trap one for instance. We just recently photographed an R8 that was used in the Bull Run Race. He was running several navigation systems in addition to his Audi system. I assume it was not an official Garmin data set but it included known speed trap areas that he must have downloaded somewhere from the web. To me it struck me as great functionality - somebody who might want to know where speed traps are. Brabec: Interesting idea not that we immediately considered. Like I said, there are a number of things that we are working on to take it to a completely new level that are currently underway that are really exciting to see. You can do so much more with a system like that. Fourtitude: It is amazing to see how rapid this whole and of technology is progressing within cars. Brabec: We have sped up our development cycle tremendously. We have not even launched the 3G and we are already having discussions about 4G right now. Fourtitude: The non 3G cars, will they be getting an update at some point? Brabec: There will be a very nice update coming next model year. Fourtitude: But they don’t occur to MOST? Brabec: It is an update to the RNS-E (TT, R8, A3). Fourtitude: That is MY2010 as well? Brabec: Yes. There will be some nice upgrades - some really nice tangible upgrades to that system. Fourtitude: I went from an S4 to an S6 and going from the RNS-E to the MOST-based MMI, the one thing I sincerely miss was the next three turns application that doesn’t seem to be available in the current 2G MMI (MOST) set-up.
Brabec: Like I said, there are nice things that we just kind of add as we go. It is definitely one nice one. The other thing that is in the navigation in the selectable set-up is that you are able to select different routes. If you choose to have that in the set-up menu it will give you the top three. Sometimes people prefer to take a certain route but it may not be the fastest which is why the navigation does not offer it to them. That is why we offer the top three and then basically you have your three as on the RNS-E and you select one of the three. So we will have that as well. Fourtitude: And that will be from the start with Q5 and then 2010? Brabec: Yes. Fourtitude: A4, A5, A6, and Q7? Brabec: Possibly. Fourtitude: Possibly? Brabec: Yes. You know we can't give all of the secrets out but yeah. I was thinking one feature and it escaped me again and it was in the context of the RNS-E where I knew there was some functionality we now also have. Oh yeah, the intersection zoom. You have seen the turnoff zoom, vastly improved in that underneath the lanes it actually gives you arrows and it selects which ones you can take so that greatly helps. Sometimes you have five or six lanes and you are really trying to figure out which lane to be in for the right exit. It will do that. But not only that, it will also animate you along the turn. As you go it will actually so you the progress of your turn and so it is not just a picture, it is a real animation inside the system. Again I think it shows a great piece of detail that the guys did that other manufacturers don’t bother with really.
Fourtitude: I would assume a lot of these details, whether it is that or the 3D or the graphic intense details. This is more of a software matter. People may be thinking they can just update the software on their old 2G, you need the chip. Brabec: For all of those right reasons we included that graphics chip. I think that it just comes nicely together with all of the features. We put ourselves in a leading position of many of those technologies; nicely integrated with iPod, navigation, hard drive, with all of the things together you just have so much at your fingertips. We are pretty sure that a majority of people do not use the full extent that the system can offer. But now you just have a lot of nice useful things. By the way, when we bring the system on the Q7 it will also have a list of diesel gas stations as a POI. Fourtitude: Oh will it? Smart move. That was the question I was going to ask when I asked about the Sirius Travel Link with the different functionality that Fords currently have. I would assume that probably offers if it works like of the same data set as a widget on my laptop. That allows you to tell which gas stations have diesel and which don't. Brabec: The Navteq database has that capability you just have to utilize it as a brand and we didn’t need it until now so we never utilized it in the current system. It will be in the new one. Fourtitude: So diesel specific models will have diesel specific POIs? Brabec: No, all models will now get a Point of Interest that is called "Diesel gas station". So any gas station that has diesel will get that but the value of this is of course to the TDI customer who pushes a button and says, "next or nearest diesel gas station" it will do that. You no longer have to sort which one is or isn’t. It will do that for you. Fourtitude: That is a smart move. Brabec: You can push and say, "next restaurant". For all of the top POI categories you can select, next bank, ATM, whatever.
Fourtitude: I know this was probably developed with as much of the European market in mind as the US and Sirius is a US phenomenon. Has there been given any thought to the Sirius travel package? Brabec: Yes, a lot of thought in fact. We are going to see the traffic piece of it but that is it for the moment. I would not say never but we are thinking about solving this need or covering it with a slightly different angle. Stay tuned. Fourtitude: Would that be in 4G? Brabec: No, sooner than next generation. Fourtitude: Would that be, perhaps it is too early to ask this. With additional functionality that could come in within the window of 3G, could that be something that could then be upgraded by owners? Brabec: It is too early to tell right now. Intuitively I would think probably not but it is too early to tell. I think that about covers it. Fourtitude: Has Bluetooth changed for 3G? Brabec: In the telephone where previously you could only basically pair with the car and you would only do it from the phone side. There would be nothing in the car that would allow you to do that. With 3G, you now have the ability to do it the other way around meaning the car actively looks for Bluetooth devices inside the car. Fourtitude: Will it pair with any other devices besides phones? Brabec: No. Fourtitude: I was thinking you could get contacts off of a laptop that was Bluetooth enabled. Brabec: No, I do not believe so. What I do believe you can do is a software update that includes the A2DP - which is an audio protocol that allows you to stream music. What you then need is an adaptor which plugs into the iPod. So you plug in a Bluetooth adaptor onto the iPod and you can stream music from the iPod and don't have to plug it in. Fourtitude: Will Audi market any attachment like that? Brabec: There are certain phones that stream MP3 music so for those it is more interesting because there you do not have to seek for something to plug the phone into. Fourtitude: So if you have paired a phone that contains music like an iPhone can you stream? Brabec: I don't think iPhone by itself has an A2DP functionality. Fourtitude: So it has to be a A2DP phones? Brabec: Yes. Fourtitude: So if you have an A2DP phone… Brabec: With the patch that can be downloaded on the Website, the 2G MMI will work. You also have to buy a special “dongle”. On the 3G system, the Bluetooth will be capable of doing this without additional hardware, and the functionality will come in near future. Fourtitude: Tell me about the download on the Website. Brabec: It’s publicly available to the customer. On www.audiusa.com we do not have the extension yet but it is on audi.de already. To do the software update you need a cable with USB because it is only updatable through USB. I am talking 2G now. Fourtitude: So 2G MMI, you can go and download the patch off of audi.de on your computer, put it on a jump drive and upload into the car via the AMI? Brabec: Yes. Fourtitude: What do you do? You just plug it in and it does what it does? You just wait till its done and it will tell you on the screen? Brabec: Yes. Fourtitude: It is available on audi.de? Brabec: Yes and we are working on making it available on www.audiusa.com. That will be available in the next few months. Fourtitude: To reiterate, you go into the CD and choose "source" iPod or whatever and it will automatically show the paired phone? Brabec: Yes. You have to also buy a little hardware dongle and then it will work. As mentioned, this functionality will be possible on the 3G without the dongle, but will come a little later. Fourtitude: Cool.
© Copyright 2004 by YourSITE.com |
