electronrun.com

It was about time! Modern cars are loaded with super advanced audio-video equipment and sophisticated GPS navigation. But what about simple, humble, good old web surfing?

Now things start to move in this front also, and BMW has presented in the Geneva automotive show its X6 beauty with full web browsing capability integrated from the factory! Imagine that you are traveling somewhere for business and are waiting for that all important email. What do you do? Easy! You park, switch off the engine -web access at front seats is deactivated when the engine is running- and use your BMW’s iDrive feature to browse those all important pages. Presto! No need to slave around in the car with a laptop any more.

Back seat passengers enjoy full web access at all times. The system uses the dash’s central high resolution screen and I have to say that among all the criticism that the iDrive’s complicated nature has attracted, finally it finds a use that justifies its design and easy access from front seats.

Wireless access is achieved via cellular connection and BMW says that the finalised system will be very close to the version presented at the show. I suppose finding a nice solution for a keyboard would be nice, but at this point maybe I am asking for too much, given the elegant integrated nature of BMW’s offer…

The use of the web in a BMW in Germany is going to involve a flat annual fee of €100-€200.

Is this going to start an avalanche of similar offers from other car manufacturers? Cutthroat competition in the German automotive industry is a standard state of things for decades now, so expect very soon similar systems from Mercedes-Benz and Audi…

Link: Crave