[bronco]

Every day I ask myself "Why people hate the iDrive?"
I trully think that it is amazing and revolutionary...I mean...look what others like MB, Audi, and others are doing almost 4 years later...They all incorporated their versions of iDrive in their cars, and nobody even mentions it when we see the little iDrive knob in the new S8 for instance

[Acuracy]

I dont know either, i personally love the Idrive in my E92. People alwayz complain about the idrive in the 7 also, but i love the IDrive in my dads 7. I dont know, i guess some people arent open to changes

Travis

[canucklion]

I think it's mostly the automotive journalists that are hating iDrive, if you do a poll (I think there's one already), most of BMW owners love it

[DocRoss]

Originally Posted by bronco

Every day I ask myself "Why people hate the iDrive?"
I trully think that it is amazing and revolutionary...I mean...look what others like MB, Audi, and others are doing almost 4 years later...They all incorporated their versions of iDrive in their cars, and nobody even mentions it when we see the little iDrive knob in the new S8 for instance

For the same reason people have posted time and time again, because they find the interface cumbersome, they find the menu tedious and time consumuing, and some feel it interferes with the primal interface between the driver and his/her car. Let's agree to disagree. Would you buy the car for idrive? Would you pass on a car if you had to have the idrive?

What do the industry followers have to do with BMW owners not liking idrive? Perhaps in their market research, people interested in driving their vehicles aprpeciate idrive-like approximations.
I don't care either way, I didn't buy your car and vice versa.

If you are in the "I like idrive camp," do you think the second hump on the dash looks good, though?

[poiney]

I think there are probably two camps:

1) Those that like BMW system because they don't know better

2) Those that know better, having used aftermarket and/or other car manufacturer systems, that rightly conclude that bmw interface is inferior in many ways, as highlighted by last and many other posts.

[poiney]

Do you think the second hump on the dash looks good, though?[/QUOTE]

I don't mind anything that is functional. The Acura TL, for example, is flush on the dash and consequently glare makes visibility difficult. So I'm in favor of the hump. Unfortunately, the penalty is a smaller screen, but overall I still favor it. And of course, that's another indirect reason that buying the built in Navi is nice, despite the bad interface.

[Paul330d]

iDrive is ok for the inherently complicated functions, such as entering a destination, but I hate having to go through all the menus just to flip from CD to radio, for example.

[nyc3r]

I wish idrive had touchscreen.. the 'target' nav option is a pain with the idrive knob.. I've seen it on a touchscreen nav on other cars (Jag, Lexus) and they're much easier to use. The jag even put little icon on each of the saved addresses so you can just click on the icon and it'll take you there.

[zamboni]

Idrive is a great tool but if you look at the early version on the 7 series is not that user friendly and I can see why people hated it.

[FJUNO78]

i tried it, and during my test drive found it to be a bit laggy. I also did not like the feel of the wheel, very un-natural feel to me.

I thought the extra hump looked bad, and after much thought opted against it. I don't regret it at all.

More importantly, why is this a question you ask yourself everyday, I find that rather odd.

[LEDZEP]

Originally Posted by Paul330d

iDrive is ok for the inherently complicated functions, such as entering a destination, but I hate having to go through all the menus just to flip from CD to radio, for example.

What about the voice commands? Why not use them instead of navigating the menus for common tasks?

[yellowg555]

Here's to hoping that BMW gets their damn act together and makes the minor improvements necessary to make iDrive and the Navigation better!

[Zirenz2006]

I love iDrive and I love the second hump. I find the dash boring w/o it.

[EHDEN]

my friends have iDrive on their bmw's..and its an awesome feature!!! its more than just navigation...everything goes through it.

[Acuracy]

Everyones is right about the BMW Navi. I am coming from a 04 TL and i loved the NAVI, it was sooo easy to input a destination and was very very user friendly. But the BMW Navi isnt as goood but its better than other cars i have driven. Just like every other option with any car there is gonna be a handful of us that like the idrive and another handful that doesnt. IE some people think CA is waste of time, but i personallly love it. Theres alwayz gonnabe differances in opinions, so like someone said lets agree to disagree.

[r3za]

idrive is awesome, 2nd hump is sexy - no hump = teh not win.

I believe a number of people hate the iDrive system because it takes a little bit to get used to it. How to use the system efficiently, and quickly. The shortcuts help alot (hold the idrive knob to the right for 2 seconds to go to navi, etc). Also it is difficult to learn when to turn it right or left or when to push it right or left.

It takes a bit of getting used to.

[adamr]

im an engineer by profession and it aint the most logically thought out software system ... i felt BMW could have done a better job in making the UI more user friendly and logical ... dont want to go through ten steps to find where to change my cars speed limiter ...

[gdnyc]

My parent's 530 has idrive. The only problem i have with it, is that it takes so many, turns and clicks to do something simple. I have experience with the Audi MMI and its a lot simpler. If you want Audio, you press a button, if you want navigation, press a button. So much easier and efficient

[Ryan(e92)]

I like it. Its not perfect but I like it.

[aspiring335]

I think iDrive is one of those things that's great in theory but let down by its execution. Many people seem to get caught up in a "you're either for us or against us" mentality when it comes to iDrive, but surely it's ok to like the theory and criticize the execution?

My E90 does not have iDrive but I rented a 320d with iDrive in the UK for a week and also a 530d with iDrive, for about the same amount of time. In both cases I found the interface unnecessarily complex and counter-intuitive, but worse than that it's the lag between input and response that bothers me. BMW should hire Apple's front-end developers to rework the interface and move to a hard drive-based system to improve the speed. Then the execution would live up to the potential.

[adamr]

...but worse than that it's the lag between input and response that bothers me...

agreed .. feels like you working on a 286 PC with 2mb ram and trying to run windows XP ...

[benwf]

Originally Posted by poiney

I think there are probably two camps:

1) Those that like BMW system because they don't know better

2) Those that know better, having used aftermarket and/or other car manufacturer systems, that rightly conclude that bmw interface is inferior in many ways, as highlighted by last and many other posts.

I'm with most posters who are saying, essentially: "personal opinions can't be wrong. If you like it, you're right, and if you don't like it, you're also right, because it is your opinion that counts." In the end, you decide what car you buy, so buy the one that makes you happiest, all things considered.

You seem to be saying the opposite... "If you like it, you're ignorant."