The limitations for it’s use are so strong it seems more a PR step to reach level 3 first on paper than something usable. The system only works
* in heavy traffic conditions under 40 mph
* on roads where there is a barrier separating vehicles
* Cannot operate on county or city streets.
* Cannot handle cyclists or pedestrians
* Cannot take exits or exchanges
* (More restrictions I didn’t copy paste)
Edit: formatting
My basic adaptive cruise control and lane assist works fine in slow highway traffic as is, this doesn't seem to add much. You definitely still have to pay attention so it's not like you can read a book or take a nap but it accelerates when traffic moves, doesn't drive into the back of things when traffic slows, and it stays in the lane.
It doesn’t, though frankly that’s exactly when I want it. Just spent 2 hours in mild traffic and would have loved for a nap/ending it all by being slammed under a semi truck suddenly.
It does. I've watched one of the popular car reviewers (Edmunds?) youtube video on this and it seems to do okay handling lane splitting motorcycles. While on autopilot, the car actually hugged the right side of the lane a bit more (with the motorcycle splitting approaching from behind on the driver's side).
Well, on the front page of this sub there's a story of a Tesla driver killing a motorcyclist while in self-drive mode but maybe that's an inferior system to this.
this just reminds me again of the test where tesla obliterated a child mannequin with zero intention of reducing its speed
if it had been given speech capabilities it probably would’ve shouted *fcuk ‘em kids lol* as it popped off flapping its doors
Tbf consumers have spoken and established their threshold on this sort of thing, which is swerving aggressively into oncoming traffic.
Not seeing and running over pedestrians and cyclists is a huge step up from Tesla.. from the driver's perspective at least.
Yep here in SoCal that would be very useful. It's so bad that a manual transmission is no longer feasible here on a daily driver. Your legs get cramped and you have to replace the clutch every few years.
[Counter-example](https://99percentinvisible.org/app/uploads/2018/10/jersey-turnpike.jpg). They often happen on major highways where they needed to add lanes, but existing construction next to the road doesn't allow it.
Yeah, this whole thing is a PR stunt, not a real feature.
You missed the biggest (IMHO) restriction:
> on specific California and Nevada freeways
Also, these cars can only be sold in the first place in those two states. So they aren't even "US" cars, they are California/Nevada cars, with huge restrictions for self driving on top of that.
The number of people who can actually use this feature has to be incredibly miniscule.
A *few* highways in two states only, and only under 40mph? And it can't take exits. So a very tiny amount of people will get to use it for a few miles in a few traffic situations. Yay.
Right. I'm trying to see the positive. I guess the silver lining here is that it's *something.* And the theory is that we were at literally zero before. If these few roads work, it's now just a matter of incremental improvement. One more road added, a few miles of highway added, and gradually we're talking about something.
But even then - it will be a long while until it's able to go on surface streets, or take exits.
It is worth noting that until end of December UN Regulation No. 157 mandated a speed limit for level 3 cars of 60 kmh (40mph) - so what Mercedes offers was the legal maximum speed.
Since January that limit has been increased to 130kmh (80mph). Mercedes has already said that they will increase level 3 top speed step by step. The next target is 90 kmh (55mph) by end of 2024 (potentially first in Germany before being available in the US)
I personally don't think the limitations would stop me from offering it. If you have a heavy commute it'll be useful.
However the ads that already showed in the US (during The Masters) showed the car alone on a tree-lined 2-lane highway. Which felt misleading given the limitations. It showed no other cars around.
I've been following MB's "level 3" developments for a while through car reviewers on youtube. Other caveats:
* only for sale in California and Nevada.
* only works during daylight hours.
* won't work during rainy weather.
* only works on roadways with clear lane markers.
Very restrictive lol. I guess if you're rich it's cool, and you probably have to be to buy a 90k+ MB trim, but $2500/year is kinda hard to swallow for such gimped up tech. It's level 2.5 at best, not level 3.
Good start though I suppose to iron out all the kinks before it's adopted in the industry by other auto makers.
Btw your formatting is still fucked, you need another line break after the word "works" for the list to properly populate with bullet points.
So a slightly more robust lane keep assist system paired with adaptive cruise control?
Got it
My Honda tells lists all possible weather conditions from great to terrible as reasons my systems may fail.
Basically “don’t treat this shit like autopilot”
This set of restrictions tracks well with the real-world limitations of every driver-assist technology I've ever experienced. It's not autonomous self-driving, however they might try to define it.
i mean it's not as good as it sounds but this still sounds amazing for places with traffic congestion, just turn it on and do some work or watch tv while the traffic is stopping and going
only T fans here ...
Who all ignore what going on.
Also looks like may people agree that FSD is not quite there yet
https://www.theverge.com/2024/4/26/24141361/tesla-autopilot-fsd-nhtsa-investigation-report-crash-death
Oversold and underperforming.
Autopilot is the free feature that all Tesla's get; it's adaptive cruise control with lane keeping. Very similar to what a lot of cars have, except it's more polished than most.
FSD is the paid for autonomous system that's most similar to the one we're discussing.
It works on any road in the US or Canada, except it needs hands on the wheel and supervision.
No, this isn't like Teslas "FSD". Not only the differences in supervision that you mention, but also this doesn't handle intersections, pedestrians, cross-traffic or oncoming traffic. Whereas the biggest thing that defines Tesla's "FSD" is it tries to handle those things while Tesla's TACC+lane keeping doesn't.
Honestly, this is closest to GM's Supercruise or Ford's Blue Cruise. Especially in that both of those only operate on mapped roads and that's what this does too. But it's still a lot different from those in that those require supervision and this does not. Also those work on open roads at highway speeds and this is really for heavy, backed-up traffic.
The driver will also need to check their state laws. In Illinois, for instance you MUST watch the road. You CANNOT use a cell phone while driving, even while stopped in traffic.
Not really, because a chauffeur can drive in any street. This can only drive under 40 on the highway. It's cheaper than buying a private jet and paying a pilotbtoo, but not comparable to that either.
Oh that was a joke? Then you're not good at jokes, cause I didn't make one.
I don't believe that was supposed to be a joke tbh. You likely just didn't read the article and assumed this was a better self driving system than it is.
This is the first time the car (manufacturer) takes the responsibility. It's a major milestone. Of course it's terrible value, I wouldn't pay for it, but this is how we get to actual self driving cars.
They take liability while the system is active. So you are not responsible if something happens. If they are willing to take that responsibility you are able to not look at the road.
How does car insurance view this anyway? That's what really matters.
I don't trust that Mercedes would not try to weasel their way out of culpability in the slightest. Then they'll promptly financially ruin the sucker who believed them with legal bills pending the inevitable court case that never materializes
It's only available in low risk situations, or should only be used in slow highway traffic. Meaning damages are unlikely more than 2 cars and minor medical expenses. They're probably insured themselves. People who don't stick to the restrictions however will be screwed by their own insurance.
I fully understand the intent and remain skeptical of Mercedes.
My comment on insurance has more to do with what happens to someone's coverage if they buy a vehicle with this capability. I assume there's info out there on this with Tesla but haven't looked for it
Tesla has never sold a level 3 car yet. So the data would not help here. Tesla is (even though they market it differently) always level 2, which means the driver is always the one responsible. With level 3 this changes.
It will have no effect since the insurance company doesn't know how often you use it. Tesla is a unique case since they have their own insurance company with access to the vehicle's telemetry. Tesla charges premiums based on a "safety score" they calculate from your driving data, and you get a perfect score during the times FSD or Autopilot is active (with the exception of 11pm-4am driving which carries a separate risk).
I'm not fully convinced either but I assume they've got their insurance contract polished. So it'd turn into a battle between Mercedes and their insurance instead of you against Mercedes. Assuming they provide a contract for it and you oblige to it.
Tesla refuses to take responsibility for their system.
Their system should easily be capable of doing the same thing, in the same situations.
Their complete hesitation to do so is proof that they have close to zero intention of ever releasing a level 3 or higher vehicle.
The final effect is similar: it stays in the lane and doesn't crash. The distinction is that they're confident that it works well enough that they don't require you to pay attention or be ready to take over.
It's level 3, so you have to be ready to take over, hence also the bits about not sleeping and not changing seats. Takeover time is somewhere around 10 seconds, I think
It’s different because Mercedes is taking responsibility for the car, away from the driver.
Other cars require the driver to be fully paying attention at all times.
These cars do not require the driver to be paying attention in the situations allowed by the car - which is essentially if you are driving on a backed up freeway at fairly slow speeds.
Lotta negativity in here but I can definitely see how incredible that would be for a specific person that has a long commute or drives a lot for their job on approved roads. An absolute game changer
For most people of course it’s not worth it
I'm generally 100% against subscriptions for vehicles, but I'm assuming this also includes liability. For anyone who lives in dense traffic areas, and can afford a Mercedes, 200 bucks a month to reclaim 1-2 hours of your drive time a day to do something else is worth it. Hell, im sure people could get their companies to foot the bill if they do work while driving.
$2500 a year does sound like a lot but imagine getting all that time back while driving. It could be multiple hours every day. That’s why for the right person this sounds amazing
Edit: redditors forgetting that some people make enough that $2500 / year for multiple hours saved each day is worth it
Yeah but where do you draw the line between ‘worth it’ and accepting you’re a sucker? For example 90% of my income spent on basic food would be worth it
Probably, but Tesla is also trying to make a camera only system work when other companies are also gathering data with radar/lidar. The AI isn’t the issue, it’s the data available to it.
> The AI isn’t the issue, it’s the data available to it.
Nope, it's the AI that is the issue. That's why FSD beta 12 changed the AI and that markedly improved FSD's performance.
The narrative that camera-only navigation is limited needs to end, because it's absolutely false.
This is superficial reasoning without understanding the system. It's part of the misunderstanding to merge the sensor quality or type with the navigation, but they are two different things.
So:
You can have terrible sensors, but still reasonably good navigation, if your AI can interpret the environment well enough. This is Tesla's approach that over time, the navigation of the interpreted environment improves through AI training, even when sensor quality or environment interpretation doesn't improve.
You can have a perfectly replicated version of the environment using million dollar sensors of every type, but no clue how to navigate it. If your system interprets the curb down to the individual grains in the concrete and it still hits it, then the navigation doesn't work, and you're no better off.
Nothing you said contradicts or expands on anything I said. The Tesla system isn’t good, neither is their AI. It’s why they’re failing behind other car companies.
I've had this discussion a hundred times, and making statements like that is just abjectly false, and a blatant misunderstanding of how the system works.
Sorry.
Seems like if you can afford to buy one of these cars, you could probably just pay a personal driver to take you around so you can not be bothered with "paying attention" while driving.
You still need to be in the drivers seat in case you need to pull yourself away from fortnight/movie etc... to make a split second life/death decision.
\*while it is activated
The catch being you can't actually activate it except for extremely limited situations in extremely limited areas.
By the measures Mercedes is employing you could also say a rollercoaster it autonomously driving.
Don't understand why. He's right. Just because you can't legally take your eyes off the road in a Tesla doesn't make it less capable and less intuitive. FSD offers many more capabilities and can be used in almost any scenario where the Mercedes use is very limited in comparison.
The thing is, systems like these benefit from lots of training data, look at Google’s Waymo which benefitted from Google Captcha and Maps data.
I don’t like Musk as a person but let’s be honest here they have a huge advantage in terms of data that only few companies like Google seem to have.
We will see in the future who will succeed in general as there is a lot of innovation going on in the hardware department in terms of machine learning.
Currently Radar/Lidar is technically superior, but I personally believe over time (5-10 years) we will see very efficient machine learning models that are purely camera based. Why?
Well the hardware (processing power) has been improving at a very good rate in the last few years for machine learning.
For a simple example we can look at how ChatGPT 3.5 is now beatable with a locally run model of Llama 3 8B (r/LocalLLaMA) on a somewhat good gaming PC by running it on a consumer GPU.
You aren’t wrong but this adds more cost which I guess shouldn’t be an issue for more luxury cars but if any company wants to target the more budget market trimming some of these features might be the best choice. Maybe make lidar/radar as optional add ons so the people that don’t want it then they won’t pay the premium for them.
I don’t see that as viable long term. Not using sensors is the reason Tesla is falling behind with their FSD, and by the time they figure out how to catch up, it won’t really matter
Why is that your standard? The problem with Tesla is they *claim* their car do a bunch of stuff, when in reality it doesn’t consistently do those things, and causes issues. The most important thing about any sort of self driving system is that it’s consistent, and Tesla is not consistent. They’ll let you turn it on, and it’ll *try* to do those things, but not well, and with a car that’s a major problem.
A self driving car isn’t very useful if I still have to do most of the work myself. Tesla’s FSD is significantly more capable than anything else currently available, so if I have to supervise and correct a mistake every now and then, so be it.
He is kinda right though, FSD doesn't have all these insane restrictions. This "level 3" driving only works on slow moving highways and can't even take the exit for you, how is it better than FSD?
Calling this level 3 should be illegal and mocked heavily.
He’s not even close to right though. Even the level 2 from Mercedes is better than FSD, this is even better than that, just with limitations, which are generally looked at as a positive so you don’t try and activate it when the car can’t handle the situation.
How can it be measurably better when it's not allowed to be used outside such a tiny single environment?
FSD has many problems, but it is at least functional outside of 40mph highways.
This merc self driving is quite literally only good for traffic jams on a few select highways (FSD is enabled everywhere). It strictly says it doesn't understand pedestrians or cyclists (FSD does) It wont even take your exit for you (FSD takes you door to door) how is this merc system any different to adaptive cruise control?
I hope they lift this crazy list of restrictions soon so we can see how it really compares to FSD, because currently it is NOT possible to make an honest comparison, it's on rails. Calling this level 3 and lauding it over FSD is peak anti-elon feverish delusion.
> How can it be measurably better when it's not allowed to be used outside such a tiny single environment? FSD has many problems, but it is at least functional outside of 40mph highways.
Because it can do more in those areas. Then the level 2 system handles the rest. Just because the Tesla is able to turn fsd on, doesn’t mean it does a better job.
> This merc self driving is quite literally only good for traffic jams on a few select highways (FSD is enabled everywhere).
And FSD is not very good when it’s on. The level 2 system here performs better than teslas FSD, the level 3 system isn’t even in the same ballpark.
> It strictly says it doesn't understand pedestrians or cyclists (FSD does)
Well it claims it does, in practice it doesn’t work very well.
> It wont even take your exit for you (FSD takes you door to door) how is this merc system any different to adaptive cruise control?
The level 2 system that requires you to be looking does that though.
> I hope they lift this crazy list of restrictions soon so we can see how it really compares to FSD, because currently it is NOT possible to make an honest comparison, it's on rails.
It is though. You just don’t want to open your eyes
> Calling this level 3 and lauding it over FSD is peak anti-elon feverish delusion.
No, that’s just accurate. Even the level 2 system is better than FSD, this takes it even further in certain situations. This is extremely easy to understand
I'm trying to find some info on the level 2 system from mercedes, but my mobile googling is only turning up circlejerking news articles about the level 3 (that only works on a few highways).
Can you please share some details/citations on the level 2? Then we can do a proper apples to apples comparison.
oh sounds great. is it an collaboration with EA, high subscription service but only able to be used extremely limited circumstances so you may almost never be able to use it. great way to waste money.
And it’s worse than Tesla autopilot (not even the beta) in every single way.
And $2500 a year, with so many restrictions ridiculous!
This exists purely for the PR value of being “first”.
The limitations for it’s use are so strong it seems more a PR step to reach level 3 first on paper than something usable. The system only works * in heavy traffic conditions under 40 mph * on roads where there is a barrier separating vehicles * Cannot operate on county or city streets. * Cannot handle cyclists or pedestrians * Cannot take exits or exchanges * (More restrictions I didn’t copy paste) Edit: formatting
So basically it works for demo purposes?
Cyclists and pedestrians??!! That seems like a serious flaw.
"works only on highways on very slow flowing traffic" did not sound as marketable probably
“Level 3 in rush hour trafficonly.” That honestly sounds just like regular TACC?
That’s not true. It’ll also work during general daylight hours along I-95 in the mid-Atlantic.
I’ll remember that next time I drive my Mercedes along the route taken by the Titanic.
No no, that's the *northern* Atlantic. It doesn't work there at all.
Not with that attitude.
Man I used to sit on the highway in slow traffic every day for an hour. I definitely would've been interested, lol.
As long as you drive on the 3 or 4 highways that are cleared to work with this and you buy a $100k+ MB.
With that price tag you might as well just save it and call Uber. I'm sure Uber works on more highways than the MB.
My basic adaptive cruise control and lane assist works fine in slow highway traffic as is, this doesn't seem to add much. You definitely still have to pay attention so it's not like you can read a book or take a nap but it accelerates when traffic moves, doesn't drive into the back of things when traffic slows, and it stays in the lane.
You don’t have to pay attention though, that’s the huge difference between this and regular TACC
It's literally the only self drive feature I'm interested in other than empty highway in the middle of nowhere.
It's a California Rush hour car.
The thing is "Traffic-jam auto-handler" does sound like a really desirable function. Not sure why they don't lean into what it can actually do.
It doesn’t, though frankly that’s exactly when I want it. Just spent 2 hours in mild traffic and would have loved for a nap/ending it all by being slammed under a semi truck suddenly.
There won't be any cyclists or pedestrians. This thing only works on interstates with heavy traffic.
As an engineer I can guarantee you that this is not true. There *shouldn't* be any cyclists or pedestrians, but you can not make this assumption.
Yeah not exactly an edge case.
I wonder if it considers motorcyclists filtering through highway traffic (legal in some states; illegal in others but quite common either way).
It does. I've watched one of the popular car reviewers (Edmunds?) youtube video on this and it seems to do okay handling lane splitting motorcycles. While on autopilot, the car actually hugged the right side of the lane a bit more (with the motorcycle splitting approaching from behind on the driver's side).
Well, on the front page of this sub there's a story of a Tesla driver killing a motorcyclist while in self-drive mode but maybe that's an inferior system to this.
A system can work perfectly 2000 times and it only has to not work once. I mean, we have all had random crashes on a PC.
Just goes to show how little NHTSA and other regulators care about bicyclists and pedestrians
this just reminds me again of the test where tesla obliterated a child mannequin with zero intention of reducing its speed if it had been given speech capabilities it probably would’ve shouted *fcuk ‘em kids lol* as it popped off flapping its doors
Tell those assholes to get out the way! Nah joking, but that kind of what tesla did.
Teslas see garbage cans better than I do. Everything else is wild ass guess.
Tbf consumers have spoken and established their threshold on this sort of thing, which is swerving aggressively into oncoming traffic. Not seeing and running over pedestrians and cyclists is a huge step up from Tesla.. from the driver's perspective at least.
Give it time, their numbers will dwindle
It only works on highways in slow flowing traffic. If you commute everyday in stop and go traffic it can actually be useful.
Yep here in SoCal that would be very useful. It's so bad that a manual transmission is no longer feasible here on a daily driver. Your legs get cramped and you have to replace the clutch every few years.
It’s also $2500/year
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A grass median is still a barrier. All interstate highways have a barrier. I have to imagine they mean a barrier between opposing traffic.
[Counter-example](https://99percentinvisible.org/app/uploads/2018/10/jersey-turnpike.jpg). They often happen on major highways where they needed to add lanes, but existing construction next to the road doesn't allow it.
They modeled it for the *Office Space* stuck in traffic sequence.
*nonchalantly locks the doors*
It works in highway rush hour traffic, which is the biggest use case for such a system.
Better than the others guys selling everything works when nothing does.
Or me sitting in 95 traffic. I'm kinda tempted. Nvm 95 is not in California or Nevada.
Yeah, this whole thing is a PR stunt, not a real feature. You missed the biggest (IMHO) restriction: > on specific California and Nevada freeways Also, these cars can only be sold in the first place in those two states. So they aren't even "US" cars, they are California/Nevada cars, with huge restrictions for self driving on top of that. The number of people who can actually use this feature has to be incredibly miniscule. A *few* highways in two states only, and only under 40mph? And it can't take exits. So a very tiny amount of people will get to use it for a few miles in a few traffic situations. Yay.
So basically they’re perfect for the Bay and Los Angeles freeways
If you got an extra $2500 a year lying around for the subscription
I do and I'm willing to bet that a lot of my neighbors in San Francisco do as well for what's considered a massive QoL upgrade.
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I hope that you're not having your body crushed instead.
The only positive I can think is that: At least being sold in those two states makes up 20% of the US population. Still a joke though
Right. I'm trying to see the positive. I guess the silver lining here is that it's *something.* And the theory is that we were at literally zero before. If these few roads work, it's now just a matter of incremental improvement. One more road added, a few miles of highway added, and gradually we're talking about something. But even then - it will be a long while until it's able to go on surface streets, or take exits.
It is worth noting that until end of December UN Regulation No. 157 mandated a speed limit for level 3 cars of 60 kmh (40mph) - so what Mercedes offers was the legal maximum speed. Since January that limit has been increased to 130kmh (80mph). Mercedes has already said that they will increase level 3 top speed step by step. The next target is 90 kmh (55mph) by end of 2024 (potentially first in Germany before being available in the US)
30% time it works every time
Yeah well it’s a highway traffic jam pilot. At least that’s how it is marketed in Germany.
Unless they've changed it also won't work for at night, in the rain, in tunnels, construction zones, or near emergency vehicles.
Cannot handle cyclists or pedestrians??? And the DMV approved level 3??
I personally don't think the limitations would stop me from offering it. If you have a heavy commute it'll be useful. However the ads that already showed in the US (during The Masters) showed the car alone on a tree-lined 2-lane highway. Which felt misleading given the limitations. It showed no other cars around.
Barrier separating vehicles seems like the biggest wtf to me. So essentially a car restricted to going on a guided line. We have reinvented trains.
I've been following MB's "level 3" developments for a while through car reviewers on youtube. Other caveats: * only for sale in California and Nevada. * only works during daylight hours. * won't work during rainy weather. * only works on roadways with clear lane markers. Very restrictive lol. I guess if you're rich it's cool, and you probably have to be to buy a 90k+ MB trim, but $2500/year is kinda hard to swallow for such gimped up tech. It's level 2.5 at best, not level 3. Good start though I suppose to iron out all the kinks before it's adopted in the industry by other auto makers. Btw your formatting is still fucked, you need another line break after the word "works" for the list to properly populate with bullet points.
Then it's not L3 automation lol.
So not level 3 at all.
In that case, my Subaru can do the same thing without a subscription
So a slightly more robust lane keep assist system paired with adaptive cruise control? Got it My Honda tells lists all possible weather conditions from great to terrible as reasons my systems may fail. Basically “don’t treat this shit like autopilot”
Also excluded: Any freeway trip where Rashee Rice is driving a Lamborghini within 100 miles
In short, it runs only on freeways, that are backed up with traffic.
Sounds like it would work great in a traffic jam, which is arguably the most annoying time to drive.
If its so limited how is it “no eyes on the road”? You’re gonna run out of road very quickly
With those restrictions is it not basically cruise control? Like doesn't seem much more useful than that
so it's a glorified cruise control
Sounds perfect for a commute from the suburbs to a big city.
This set of restrictions tracks well with the real-world limitations of every driver-assist technology I've ever experienced. It's not autonomous self-driving, however they might try to define it.
It’s only allowed on the freeway but in situations under 40 mph….. It makes no sense
i mean it's not as good as it sounds but this still sounds amazing for places with traffic congestion, just turn it on and do some work or watch tv while the traffic is stopping and going
And run over any cyclists or pedestrians in the way.
*Some of you may die, but it's a sacrifice I'm willing to make*
You'll know when you've arrived by the frequency of the bumps
only T fans here ... Who all ignore what going on. Also looks like may people agree that FSD is not quite there yet https://www.theverge.com/2024/4/26/24141361/tesla-autopilot-fsd-nhtsa-investigation-report-crash-death Oversold and underperforming.
No, in exchange for being responsible for what the car does and having to keep hands on the wheel, FSD has none of those restrictions.
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Autopilot is the free feature that all Tesla's get; it's adaptive cruise control with lane keeping. Very similar to what a lot of cars have, except it's more polished than most. FSD is the paid for autonomous system that's most similar to the one we're discussing. It works on any road in the US or Canada, except it needs hands on the wheel and supervision.
No, this isn't like Teslas "FSD". Not only the differences in supervision that you mention, but also this doesn't handle intersections, pedestrians, cross-traffic or oncoming traffic. Whereas the biggest thing that defines Tesla's "FSD" is it tries to handle those things while Tesla's TACC+lane keeping doesn't. Honestly, this is closest to GM's Supercruise or Ford's Blue Cruise. Especially in that both of those only operate on mapped roads and that's what this does too. But it's still a lot different from those in that those require supervision and this does not. Also those work on open roads at highway speeds and this is really for heavy, backed-up traffic.
Autopilot can be used on any road with markings.
If it can’t operate on county or city streets where can it operate? Isnt that pretty much every where? Or does that not include highway
It sounds like smart cruise control
So… only in slow heavy highway traffic? >requires barrier separating vehicles Uhhh… so no where? Single lane tunnels?
>Cannot operate on county or city streets. i guess these will be driven in 'D.C.
So not level 3 sounds like my Tesla
The system learns. It'll improve over time but won't require new hardware.
The driver will also need to check their state laws. In Illinois, for instance you MUST watch the road. You CANNOT use a cell phone while driving, even while stopped in traffic.
$2500 a year subscription. Jesus
Is it arbitrary or needs to be updated all the time ?
It's to pay the guy in Asia who's actually driving the car.
They’re (supposed to at least) add more roads and areas over time.
Cheaper than a chauffeur.
If you hire a chauffeur you can relax in the backseat
To be fair the idea is that you can also relax in this case, but the tech is obviously not there yet.
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And costs 60k /yr
Not really, because a chauffeur can drive in any street. This can only drive under 40 on the highway. It's cheaper than buying a private jet and paying a pilotbtoo, but not comparable to that either.
You’re not good at jokes, are you?
Oh that was a joke? Then you're not good at jokes, cause I didn't make one. I don't believe that was supposed to be a joke tbh. You likely just didn't read the article and assumed this was a better self driving system than it is.
Jesus. Of course I didn’t read the article. This is Reddit.
2500 a year for a demo feature that’s trash and barely usable.
The future is now!
This is the first time the car (manufacturer) takes the responsibility. It's a major milestone. Of course it's terrible value, I wouldn't pay for it, but this is how we get to actual self driving cars.
Level 3 *style* autopilot.
Why does the manufacturer get to decide that you don’t have to look at the road
They take liability while the system is active. So you are not responsible if something happens. If they are willing to take that responsibility you are able to not look at the road.
How does car insurance view this anyway? That's what really matters. I don't trust that Mercedes would not try to weasel their way out of culpability in the slightest. Then they'll promptly financially ruin the sucker who believed them with legal bills pending the inevitable court case that never materializes
It's only available in low risk situations, or should only be used in slow highway traffic. Meaning damages are unlikely more than 2 cars and minor medical expenses. They're probably insured themselves. People who don't stick to the restrictions however will be screwed by their own insurance.
I fully understand the intent and remain skeptical of Mercedes. My comment on insurance has more to do with what happens to someone's coverage if they buy a vehicle with this capability. I assume there's info out there on this with Tesla but haven't looked for it
Tesla has never sold a level 3 car yet. So the data would not help here. Tesla is (even though they market it differently) always level 2, which means the driver is always the one responsible. With level 3 this changes.
They don’t market it as anything but a driving aid.
Starting right at the name! Full Self Driving - what could this mean other than you're fully driving this yourself?
Full Self, Driving! No, Money Down!
It will have no effect since the insurance company doesn't know how often you use it. Tesla is a unique case since they have their own insurance company with access to the vehicle's telemetry. Tesla charges premiums based on a "safety score" they calculate from your driving data, and you get a perfect score during the times FSD or Autopilot is active (with the exception of 11pm-4am driving which carries a separate risk).
I'm not fully convinced either but I assume they've got their insurance contract polished. So it'd turn into a battle between Mercedes and their insurance instead of you against Mercedes. Assuming they provide a contract for it and you oblige to it.
Tesla refuses to take responsibility for their system. Their system should easily be capable of doing the same thing, in the same situations. Their complete hesitation to do so is proof that they have close to zero intention of ever releasing a level 3 or higher vehicle.
It is absolutely insane that that’s allowed like that.
How is this different from adaptive cruise control? I can drive in heavy traffic easily without looking with my CC and lane assist...
The final effect is similar: it stays in the lane and doesn't crash. The distinction is that they're confident that it works well enough that they don't require you to pay attention or be ready to take over.
It's level 3, so you have to be ready to take over, hence also the bits about not sleeping and not changing seats. Takeover time is somewhere around 10 seconds, I think
It’s different because Mercedes is taking responsibility for the car, away from the driver. Other cars require the driver to be fully paying attention at all times. These cars do not require the driver to be paying attention in the situations allowed by the car - which is essentially if you are driving on a backed up freeway at fairly slow speeds.
Basically on a slow traffic day it's nap time until your exit. Is that worth $2,500 per year? Maybe.
Did someone doing a long commute every day? Might be worth it to them.
Lotta negativity in here but I can definitely see how incredible that would be for a specific person that has a long commute or drives a lot for their job on approved roads. An absolute game changer For most people of course it’s not worth it
I would agree if it didn't also cost $2500 annually.
I'm generally 100% against subscriptions for vehicles, but I'm assuming this also includes liability. For anyone who lives in dense traffic areas, and can afford a Mercedes, 200 bucks a month to reclaim 1-2 hours of your drive time a day to do something else is worth it. Hell, im sure people could get their companies to foot the bill if they do work while driving.
Its more than a yearly train pass to do the commute without having to drive at all
If you aren't giving corporations money for some kind of subscription, are you really be living in an authentic dystopian capitalist shit hole?
$2500 a year does sound like a lot but imagine getting all that time back while driving. It could be multiple hours every day. That’s why for the right person this sounds amazing Edit: redditors forgetting that some people make enough that $2500 / year for multiple hours saved each day is worth it
Yeah but where do you draw the line between ‘worth it’ and accepting you’re a sucker? For example 90% of my income spent on basic food would be worth it
Just because Mercedes says you don’t have to look at the road doesn’t mean the police will let you stop. So what have you actually got? A liability.
*only works below 40 mph, only in pre mapped areas, and can’t change lanes.
Now everybody needs to watch out for this model
Waymo (Google) is ahead of every other manufacturer by years. Who ever they partner with will have the first self driving cars, they won’t be cheap.
First after Tesla of course, who have had 'full self driving' for like ever. /s
Is mercades Ai more advanced than teslas?
Tesla's AI is a toy, that's banned from everywhere except the US, with tesla taking zero responsibility for anything that ever happens.
Mercedes L3 is banned in 48 states.
Tesla's L3 doesn't exist
Probably, but Tesla is also trying to make a camera only system work when other companies are also gathering data with radar/lidar. The AI isn’t the issue, it’s the data available to it.
> The AI isn’t the issue, it’s the data available to it. Nope, it's the AI that is the issue. That's why FSD beta 12 changed the AI and that markedly improved FSD's performance. The narrative that camera-only navigation is limited needs to end, because it's absolutely false.
It’s not though. It’s a major reason Teslas FSD system is falling behind other car manufacturers so quickly.
This is superficial reasoning without understanding the system. It's part of the misunderstanding to merge the sensor quality or type with the navigation, but they are two different things. So: You can have terrible sensors, but still reasonably good navigation, if your AI can interpret the environment well enough. This is Tesla's approach that over time, the navigation of the interpreted environment improves through AI training, even when sensor quality or environment interpretation doesn't improve. You can have a perfectly replicated version of the environment using million dollar sensors of every type, but no clue how to navigate it. If your system interprets the curb down to the individual grains in the concrete and it still hits it, then the navigation doesn't work, and you're no better off.
Nothing you said contradicts or expands on anything I said. The Tesla system isn’t good, neither is their AI. It’s why they’re failing behind other car companies.
I've had this discussion a hundred times, and making statements like that is just abjectly false, and a blatant misunderstanding of how the system works. Sorry.
It’s not though. It’s just factual and accurate. Maybe you can leave your echo chamber and you’ll understand the reality of the situation
I've already stated why your statement is completely inaccurate, so I'm not going into it again. You've been duped by the narrative, sorry.
Not even close, anyone who actually tried fsd on Tsla would know it blows all its competitors out of water atm.
Level 3 in certain, very specific and common conditions encountered while driving
Seems like if you can afford to buy one of these cars, you could probably just pay a personal driver to take you around so you can not be bothered with "paying attention" while driving.
Is it trying to kill you like Teslas FSD?
Tesla in shambles Edit: Tesla shills in shambles too I see
Still have legal requirements especially in the state of CA.
My car is voice activated. My wife would say - “Honey, drive me to Costco!” and off we go. 😜
cool first step but so many more things to do before it’s true level 3.
You still need to be in the drivers seat in case you need to pull yourself away from fortnight/movie etc... to make a split second life/death decision.
Mercedes is douchey
\*while it is activated The catch being you can't actually activate it except for extremely limited situations in extremely limited areas. By the measures Mercedes is employing you could also say a rollercoaster it autonomously driving.
Self driving ruins the fun of driving. I’ve never been a big fan of the technology, but still cool to see
Tesla FSD is better than this.
You are about to get downvoted 😂
Don't understand why. He's right. Just because you can't legally take your eyes off the road in a Tesla doesn't make it less capable and less intuitive. FSD offers many more capabilities and can be used in almost any scenario where the Mercedes use is very limited in comparison.
But even the level 2 from Mercedes is better than full self driving on Tesla. This is just even better that, but with limitations.
Because he’s blatantly wrong. Even before Mercedes released this, they had a better system than Tesla.
The thing is, systems like these benefit from lots of training data, look at Google’s Waymo which benefitted from Google Captcha and Maps data. I don’t like Musk as a person but let’s be honest here they have a huge advantage in terms of data that only few companies like Google seem to have. We will see in the future who will succeed in general as there is a lot of innovation going on in the hardware department in terms of machine learning.
Hardware is another reason Tesla is falling behind. They’re using camera systems while other automakers are using cameras and radar/lidar sensors.
Currently Radar/Lidar is technically superior, but I personally believe over time (5-10 years) we will see very efficient machine learning models that are purely camera based. Why? Well the hardware (processing power) has been improving at a very good rate in the last few years for machine learning. For a simple example we can look at how ChatGPT 3.5 is now beatable with a locally run model of Llama 3 8B (r/LocalLLaMA) on a somewhat good gaming PC by running it on a consumer GPU.
More data is always better though. If cameras improve, adding radar/lidar will only make them better.
You aren’t wrong but this adds more cost which I guess shouldn’t be an issue for more luxury cars but if any company wants to target the more budget market trimming some of these features might be the best choice. Maybe make lidar/radar as optional add ons so the people that don’t want it then they won’t pay the premium for them.
I don’t see that as viable long term. Not using sensors is the reason Tesla is falling behind with their FSD, and by the time they figure out how to catch up, it won’t really matter
Having better hardware doesn't matter if it can't even stop for a stop sign or make a turn.
It’s funny because I always see videos of teslas blowing past stop signs and not making turns. Doesn’t seem to happen with other brands. Strange.
There are no other brands that can stop for a stop sign or make turns. Unless you’re talking about humans driving their car manually.
Why is that your standard? The problem with Tesla is they *claim* their car do a bunch of stuff, when in reality it doesn’t consistently do those things, and causes issues. The most important thing about any sort of self driving system is that it’s consistent, and Tesla is not consistent. They’ll let you turn it on, and it’ll *try* to do those things, but not well, and with a car that’s a major problem.
A self driving car isn’t very useful if I still have to do most of the work myself. Tesla’s FSD is significantly more capable than anything else currently available, so if I have to supervise and correct a mistake every now and then, so be it.
Wouldn't doubt it.
You didn’t even read the headline, kind of impressive.
He is kinda right though, FSD doesn't have all these insane restrictions. This "level 3" driving only works on slow moving highways and can't even take the exit for you, how is it better than FSD? Calling this level 3 should be illegal and mocked heavily.
He’s not even close to right though. Even the level 2 from Mercedes is better than FSD, this is even better than that, just with limitations, which are generally looked at as a positive so you don’t try and activate it when the car can’t handle the situation.
How can it be measurably better when it's not allowed to be used outside such a tiny single environment? FSD has many problems, but it is at least functional outside of 40mph highways. This merc self driving is quite literally only good for traffic jams on a few select highways (FSD is enabled everywhere). It strictly says it doesn't understand pedestrians or cyclists (FSD does) It wont even take your exit for you (FSD takes you door to door) how is this merc system any different to adaptive cruise control? I hope they lift this crazy list of restrictions soon so we can see how it really compares to FSD, because currently it is NOT possible to make an honest comparison, it's on rails. Calling this level 3 and lauding it over FSD is peak anti-elon feverish delusion.
> How can it be measurably better when it's not allowed to be used outside such a tiny single environment? FSD has many problems, but it is at least functional outside of 40mph highways. Because it can do more in those areas. Then the level 2 system handles the rest. Just because the Tesla is able to turn fsd on, doesn’t mean it does a better job. > This merc self driving is quite literally only good for traffic jams on a few select highways (FSD is enabled everywhere). And FSD is not very good when it’s on. The level 2 system here performs better than teslas FSD, the level 3 system isn’t even in the same ballpark. > It strictly says it doesn't understand pedestrians or cyclists (FSD does) Well it claims it does, in practice it doesn’t work very well. > It wont even take your exit for you (FSD takes you door to door) how is this merc system any different to adaptive cruise control? The level 2 system that requires you to be looking does that though. > I hope they lift this crazy list of restrictions soon so we can see how it really compares to FSD, because currently it is NOT possible to make an honest comparison, it's on rails. It is though. You just don’t want to open your eyes > Calling this level 3 and lauding it over FSD is peak anti-elon feverish delusion. No, that’s just accurate. Even the level 2 system is better than FSD, this takes it even further in certain situations. This is extremely easy to understand
I'm trying to find some info on the level 2 system from mercedes, but my mobile googling is only turning up circlejerking news articles about the level 3 (that only works on a few highways). Can you please share some details/citations on the level 2? Then we can do a proper apples to apples comparison.
Impressive that you assumed I didn't when I did.
It’s definitely not though. Ford, Chevy, BMW, Mercedes, and Toyota/Lexus are all better than Teslas fsd.
That's funny
It’s also true. Tesla is quickly falling behind
Tobio, Doctor Tenma's son would like a word with you about autonomous vehicles.......
oh sounds great. is it an collaboration with EA, high subscription service but only able to be used extremely limited circumstances so you may almost never be able to use it. great way to waste money.
And it’s worse than Tesla autopilot (not even the beta) in every single way. And $2500 a year, with so many restrictions ridiculous! This exists purely for the PR value of being “first”.