knight rider online

ok ive seen loads of messages complaining about the lack of 'buttons' on Ki3t...

how about if it was all just touch based and only lit up when required...

theres scope for lots of hidden functions

but personally i like the voice command, single screen thing as it IS a product of 21st century IT interraction...

pheonix_knight wrote:but personally i like the voice command, single screen thing as it IS a product of 21st century IT interraction...

- Until your video screen shorts out (as computer technology tends to do when introduced to violent contact like dropping a phone or hitting a monitor) and then you're left high and dry without any way to access said touch screen features until said screen is repaired. This is why I personally prefer physical buttons. Also keep in mind that no matter how advanced our automotive display technology is, it still relies heavily on the power of a car battery to function. Solar Energy helps and all but its still wired to the same central power source.

I don't think gas milage should be the only primary concern, I think our attention should also focus on how long you can keep your car batteries running the barrage of equipment we keep putting into cabin.

=VK=

victor kros wrote:- Until your video screen shorts out (as computer technology tends to do when introduced to violent contact like dropping a phone or hitting a monitor) and then you're left high and dry without any way to access said touch screen features until said screen is repaired.

To be fair, physical buttons can break too. And what is the likelihood of Mike violently slamming the LCD screens inside KITT repeatedly? If someone gets inside the car and begins smashing away, physical buttons or not - functionality will be lost.

goldbug wrote:To be fair, physical buttons can break too. And what is the likelihood of Mike violently slamming the LCD screens inside KITT repeatedly? If someone gets inside the car and begins smashing away, physical buttons or not - functionality will be lost.

Anything can potentially break, but having both physical buttons as well as LCD decreases the liklihood of all functions being out of service. It's always wise to have a failsafe.

Just take the cockpit of an F-22 and stick it in the car. Take it from there.

to be fair KITT was the processor and MK told him what to make the car do...

that was then... so buttons are not important now

but im only offering the complainers another option...

Goldbug,

You seem to neglect the fact that even in the classic Knight Rider series, with the MBS KITT was often damaged by the vibrations and reprecussions from heavy artillery attacks. Just because the "shell" can't be damaged, or in the NBC show's case "heal itself" doesn't mean that the internal components cannot be damaged by say EMP or violent vibrational/jarring impacts. You have to think outside the box of Mike damaging them himself.

I would agree with Lost Knight that you should have both options availible. Also on the show, the buttons themselves rarely ever broke down but we also know that KITT's components were routinely serviced in the Semi.

=VK=

I use touchscreens everyday at work, once I accidently hit the control console that houses the touchscreen with something and the impact caused the screen to corrupt, it was full of random letters & totally unusable. Luckily rebooting the computer fixed it. I'd imagine turboboost landing would cause impact enough the touchscreen to corrupt similar way LOL

I think your going well off too much. It is possible to be protected by an EMP attack as has said by my Physics teacher who went to Imperial. That means all radiation is covered. On high impact the car would be able to sustain equipment inside. It would probably have the equipment that is fragile I a concrete like case. This means it has little room to move about in. It may also have a sort of shock absorber on the chassis of the car so it stays stable.
Remember we have already seen a high impact collision and saw the screen work after.

I imagine that without the engine the dash board would light up with some button. Like those on a microwave which don't come out.

Have you assumed that even though Kitt may turn off it is possible to use options. Like he could voice activate it.

One criticism: with all that tech you'd think Kitt can just receiving signal to get hacked. So he can shut off the signal receptors

victor kros wrote:You seem to neglect the fact that even in the classic Knight Rider series, with the MBS KITT was often damaged by the vibrations and reprecussions from heavy artillery attacks. Just because the "shell" can't be damaged, or in the NBC show's case "heal itself" doesn't mean that the internal components cannot be damaged by say EMP or violent vibrational/jarring impacts. You have to think outside the box of Mike damaging them himself.

All I'm saying is that physical buttons are not inherently superior in any way to a touch screen and vice versa (once just looks a tad more modern). You gave the example of a touch screen shorting out, I'm saying a button (or the circuits behind it) can be damaged as well. I agree both would be handy.

Mango mentioned F-22's. Boeing has gone with all glass displays in it's commercial jetliners as they are simpler and more reliable. I think what's happening in modern appliances is also instructional.

Ranges, Washer/Dryers, Refrigerators etc used to be covered with knobs and buttons. The new thing seems to be a touch screen display that comes to life when you touch it with an almost holographic appearance. If this is 'today' in appliances, it certainly could be 'tomorrow' in autos.

As far as which system is more robust, I doubt that matters to the writers. The system will not fail unless it serves the writer's purposes. The only thing that matters is the 'cool' factor.

Shapeshifter wrote:As far as which system is more robust, I doubt that matters to the writers. The system will not fail unless it serves the writer's purposes. The only thing that matters is the 'cool' factor.

You make a good point, Shapeshifter, but the practicality factor seems to have been the priority in the backdoor pilot, as Sarah says, "Complicated isn't always better," in reference to K.I.T.T.'s fuel economy explanation. All of K.I.T.T.'s features were based on current technology to give it more of a realistic factor. By going this route, it gave the Knight 3000 a lot of limitations making it arguably inferior to the Knight 2000. My point is that the 'cool' factor seems to have been watered down with too much realism. The old series followed the idea of not exactly specifying classic K.I.T.T.'s limitations unless the story called for it. Case in point with the writers' bible for the original series (i.g. "How fast can K.I.T.T. go?" "How fast do you want him to go?").

Lost Knight wrote:All of K.I.T.T.'s features were based on current technology to give it more of a realistic factor. By going this route, it gave the Knight 3000 a lot of limitations making it arguably inferior to the Knight 2000. My point is that the 'cool' factor seems to have been watered down with too much realism.

I think some of those statements were actually a spin on the fact that their budget (and time) was very limited. Plus, since this occured during the writer's strike, even if they wanted to change a line about KITT's abilities significantly they couldn't have. Now freed of such limitations (writing wise) I think they have a better shot at upping KITT's cool factor. Also, I think (based on the interview with the producer) we should also expect to see many more jazzed up features, which I'm looking forward to a lot.

instead of a touch screen, why not put significant functions on the steering wheel thumb buttons, like real cars actually have for cruise control, and even radio stations. You could easily put Turbo Boost, Ski Mode, Super Pursuit/Attack Mode, Ejection Seat and whatever functions onto the steering wheel, easy to reach in a hurry

Kram061-1 wrote:instead of a touch screen, why not put significant functions on the steering wheel thumb buttons, like real cars actually have for cruise control, and even radio stations. You could easily put Turbo Boost, Ski Mode, Super Pursuit/Attack Mode, Ejection Seat and whatever functions onto the steering wheel, easy to reach in a hurry

However, if the Ejection Seat button is next to the Turbo Boost button, I might call that a serious design flaw...

ok. point well taken. I was just throwing out functions (btw-I'd be surprised if even half that stuff was put in this car)

Why are we forgetting that the secondary (or primary, how ever you wish to think about it) interface is verbal. We are talking about a car that can speak and listen.

Touch screen has some good advantages. Anytime one wants to put a new feature in, the upgrade is merely a computer graphic over physically rebuilding the dash. (And, they put some bizarre buttons on that dash.) It can also lead to sub-routine programming and fancy displays and who knows what.

On the down side, it almost demands that the driver's eyes are not on the road. There's that sense of touch that a physical button provides. A touch screen uses the key word SCREEN. And, screen is visual, requiring eyes to use. Not very good if you are feeling your way across a flat screen with no hint as to where the turbo zone is over the climate control zone. Really cool to reach for the jump button to clear that canyon, only to blast yourself with full A/C...while plummeting off the edge.

As for buttons on the wheel, I've ALWAYS been pro to this. Classic or modern, it just makes sense that if you are going to have half a second to hit the turbo boost button to jump that child that just wandered into the street while you are doing 180 MPH, it takes less time to move a thumb over a button over a whole hand to the dash that's a foot away. Plus, when you go into the third dimension, you sure as ever are going to want both hands on the wheel over one flopping about on the dash board. Super easy to get familiar with positions of said buttons, to boot.

Yo...this is KITT we're talking about here! The driver doesn't need to keep his eyes on the road.

It's KITT