On November 20, 2024, Shubham Shah and I discovered a security vulnerability in Subaru’s STARLINK admin panel that gave us unrestricted access to all vehicles and customer accounts in the United States, Canada, and Japan.
Shit is designed like shit and crashes/freezes all the time. A pop up you have to hit AGREE on pops up every time you turn on the car and you have to wait a solid 5 seconds before you can hit it. You have NO control over the touch screen until you do so. None of the physical buttons work either. So whatever volume you had your speakers at when you turned the car off is what you get for a solid 5 seconds when you turn the car on before you can turn the speakers down. What kind of shit for brains developers/engineers were responsible for that gem?
It is categorically awful. It’s really unfortunate that a bad touch screen system can basically eliminate a car for perspective buyers.
Just a couple corrections. I have a '24 WRX and the volume knob and physical buttons work when the pop-up is in screen; they work immediately when I start the car. There’s only temperature up and down and front and rear defrosters, so not exactly a lot.
Also, prospective not perspective.
I generally agree, hate the pop-up, hate the touchscreen, but when it’s the only option it’s kinda like, okay then.
Mazda has the same pop up issue. Luckily online you can flash a program to a USB stick that lets you pick and choose infotainment hacks to apply to your car, that pop up, and the restrictions on using the touch screen when moving along them, and then you just plug it into the car and it auto applies.
Are there any car infotainment systems that aren’t complete shit?
I bought a Subaru over 10 years ago and I didn’t give the infotainment part enough scrutiny when checking it out. I love the way the car drives, but anything dealing with the radio just pisses me off. I don’t even have Starlink.
I have a 9-year old Subaru I bought used, first thing I did was trash the “radio” and replace it with an iDoing chinese Android head unit.
It’s not super polished, but much better than the trash Subaru put on it. The good thing they did was NOT integrate it into the car too much, so replacing it meant losing no functionality at all.
Are there any car infotainment systems that aren’t complete shit?
Absolutely.
The infotainment system in my car consists of a glass-mount phone holder that turns the in-panel display from a worthless piece of glass into a convenient spot to rest my phone while I drive. A+, 10/10, would highly recommend.
(I did mount it on the corner of the display, but I don’t actually use the built-in system. Haven’t even bothered to get the backup camera replaced since it stopped working.)
The Starlink system is TRRAAAAAAAAAASH.
Shit is designed like shit and crashes/freezes all the time. A pop up you have to hit AGREE on pops up every time you turn on the car and you have to wait a solid 5 seconds before you can hit it. You have NO control over the touch screen until you do so. None of the physical buttons work either. So whatever volume you had your speakers at when you turned the car off is what you get for a solid 5 seconds when you turn the car on before you can turn the speakers down. What kind of shit for brains developers/engineers were responsible for that gem?
It is categorically awful. It’s really unfortunate that a bad touch screen system can basically eliminate a car for perspective buyers.
Just a couple corrections. I have a '24 WRX and the volume knob and physical buttons work when the pop-up is in screen; they work immediately when I start the car. There’s only temperature up and down and front and rear defrosters, so not exactly a lot.
Also, prospective not perspective.
I generally agree, hate the pop-up, hate the touchscreen, but when it’s the only option it’s kinda like, okay then.
Mazda has the same pop up issue. Luckily online you can flash a program to a USB stick that lets you pick and choose infotainment hacks to apply to your car, that pop up, and the restrictions on using the touch screen when moving along them, and then you just plug it into the car and it auto applies.
Are there any car infotainment systems that aren’t complete shit?
I bought a Subaru over 10 years ago and I didn’t give the infotainment part enough scrutiny when checking it out. I love the way the car drives, but anything dealing with the radio just pisses me off. I don’t even have Starlink.
I have a 9-year old Subaru I bought used, first thing I did was trash the “radio” and replace it with an iDoing chinese Android head unit.
It’s not super polished, but much better than the trash Subaru put on it. The good thing they did was NOT integrate it into the car too much, so replacing it meant losing no functionality at all.
Absolutely.
The infotainment system in my car consists of a glass-mount phone holder that turns the in-panel display from a worthless piece of glass into a convenient spot to rest my phone while I drive. A+, 10/10, would highly recommend.
(I did mount it on the corner of the display, but I don’t actually use the built-in system. Haven’t even bothered to get the backup camera replaced since it stopped working.)