Tesla Reduces Prices of Model S and Model X; Significant Discounts for Plaid Variants

Tesla reduces prices of the Model S and Model X

Tesla

Tesla has cut the price tag on its luxury models — again. The Model S is now $89,990, down from $94,990. The Model X is $99,990, down a whopping $10,000. The Plaid version of both luxury vehicles is $109,990. The company has been slashing prices in 2023. As a result, the Model S Plaid is now $26,000 cheaper, and the Model X Plaid is $29,000 cheaper than at the start of January.

The Model 3 and Model Y prices were not changed; however, those vehicles have already had their prices reduced in 2023.

New Hardware is Coming

The latest price adjustment comes on the heels of Investor Day, where CEO Elon Musk said that demand for Tesla is infinite. Usually, if a product is in such demand, the company would not lower prices but rather increase them. But, there is a big change on the horizon for Tesla — Hardware 4.

HW4 has already appeared in a few Model S and Model X vehicle on the company’s parking lot in Fremont. The system is supposed to be significantly improved from HW3, including better cameras. These luxury vehicles don’t sell in the same volume as the Model 3 and Model Y, so it would make sense that Tesla is trying to lure buyers to clear out all the HW3 vehicles before launching HW4.

Lack of Demand?

Some skeptics will say this price cut is due to a lack of demand. We are entering the last month of the first quarter, and all companies are looking to pad their sales stats. However, as previously stated, these two models do not have the same sales volume as the less expensive models offer. Plus, at Investor Day, company executives spent much time explaining how Tesla reduces costs and finds more efficiency. Perhaps that is equally more affordable luxury models.

In January, Tao Lin, a Tesla Vice President in China, explained how price adjustments work. “The price adjustment reflects our better planning for the supply chain in a sense, and what level the vehicle cost will be, and then we make such adjustments according to this estimate." Lin explained, "The price adjustment of a product is actually a forecast of the company's cost changes in the next period of time. The biggest difference between 2023 and last year is that the epidemic has basically passed. We believe that the supply chain has returned to normal to a large extent, and there will be no such unpredictable shortages of materials as in previous years, which brought cost uncertainty."

Only time will tell if these price cuts will increase demand for Tesla's luxury vehicles, but for now, they offer an attractive option for those in the market for a high-end electric car.

Video of Tesla Update 2024.14.3 Shows New Wiper Controls, Visualizations and More

Klaus Schmid / Not a Tesla App

Klaus Schmid on YouTube has posted a nice video overview of some of the major new features in this major update.

While most of the design changes appear to be limited to vehicles with AMD Ryzen chips, there are plenty of features to be excited about for Intel owners as well.

Parked Visualization

In the video, Klaus of course fiddles with the amazing-looking new vehicle model that is front and center while the vehicle is parked. You can freely pan, zoom, and play with the vehicle. The Cybertruck was the first vehicle to feature this new v12 design and even includes an easter egg when you tap on the glass multiple times. There’s no word on whether there are any easter eggs built into other vehicles.

The 3D model looks fantastic, but it's not immediately clear whether it's the same model that Tesla was using before this update or potentially a higher-resolution version, which could help explain the AMD requirement for this view.

The map while parked is now small and in the top-right corner of the screen. However, you can make the vehicle's visualization smaller so that it goes back to the older look with the visualization on the left and maps on the right.

The new parked visualization

Spotify Queue

Next, Klaus goes into Spotify, which now gives you the ability to queue up songs instead of just playing a predefined playlist or starting a new song immediately.

Quick Access to Car Wash Mode

Under Controls, you also now have quick access to Car Wash Mode, instead of having to remember it's under Service.

New Wiper Controls

The windshield wipers have been one of the most controversial topics on Teslas, mostly due to their automatic function not always working well. Tesla continues to add wiper controls to make them easier to manage.

In the last few updates, Tesla has now added various ways to control the wipers. You're able to add the wipers button to the dock at the bottom of the screen, use the newer multi-function control to control them with the left scroll wheel, and now Tesla is adding another way to control them.

Video of New Features

Easier Way to Change Wiper Speed

With update 2024.14.3, if you press the button on the left stalk to activate the wipers, you can now adjust their speed up by moving the scroll wheel up or down. Before this update, you could do something similar, but it required tilting the scroll wheel left/right, which wasn't as intuitive.

If you have your wipers on and set to a certain speed after installing this update, you’ll now also be able to tap the wipers button to cycle through the various speed options.

While this is a welcomed improvement, all the wiper control changes could be a little confusing for folks who don't follow Tesla as closely as we all do. In the end, the issue comes down to the automatic wiper function not working reliably, which is a little ridiculous since every automaker has already solved this problem with a $4 rain sensor. Tesla makes a lot of gambles, and I guess this one hasn’t panned out.

Full-Screen Visualizations

Owners outside of North America will finally be able to enjoy full-screen visualizations, although unfortunately, it doesn't include the full set of visualizations that are included with FSD. It appears that Tesla is keeping the full visualizations tied to FSD.

For drivers in North America who own or subscribe to FSD, which was recently lowered in price, the new full-screen view brings some improvements.

The new media player is now centered on the screen and includes additional buttons such as repeat, shuffle, search and more. You also get the small map in the corner which is useful to be able to see your next turn.

In addition, Tesla is now leaving the "Navigate to" module on the screen as well, so that you can set a new destination without leaving the admittedly nice full-screen view.

Update 2024.14.3 just started rolling out to owners yesterday, so it will be several weeks before most owners have access to this update. For now, check out all of our coverage and the release notes to see which features you can look forward to.

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The Differences Between the New Autopark on Intel vs AMD Tesla Vehicles [Video]

Tesla is starting to roll out its latest iteration of Autopark to additional vehicles. The feature that lets your vehicle park automatically was initially rolled out in North America to vehicles without ultrasonic sensors (USS). However, now with FSD v12.3.6, it's going out to vehicles with USS as well.

However, there are differences in how Autopark looks visually, depending on whether you have an infotainment unit that is based on the slower Intel Atom processor, or the latest AMD Ryzen processor.

What’s the Same

Both vehicles will receive the new Autopark and the functionality remains the same. The difference lies in the visuals and whether the vehicle is capable of displaying Tesla’s High Fidelity Park Assist. All vehicles will display available parking spots when you're traveling under 5 mph. You can then tap any of the spots to have your vehicle automatically park at the chosen location.

Intel Vehicles Will Still New New Visuals

Contrary to what was expected, vehicles with the older processor will still display some new visuals, beyond the parking spots. Think of it as a less intense version of High Fidelity Park Assist. Whereas Park Assist on AMD vehicles shows a complete 3D reconstruction of objects in 3D, Intel vehicles will display what looks more like a two-dimensional overhead view. However, it will still display road markings, like arrows and parking lines and even walls and barriers, but unfortunately, the view can not be spun in a 3D fashion like visualizations normally can.

This is a great summary of my AutoPark discoveries yesterday w/ FSD 12.3.6 on my Model 3 with Ultrasonic Sensors and INTEL Atom CPU.

More to come soon. 👊 pic.twitter.com/XH3ZR3ZGBN

— ⚡️TechGeek Tesla 🔋⚡️ (@jonbbc) April 29, 2024

The lines and objects displayed are different from the vector-based lines the vehicle normally displays on roads. FSD visualizations aren’t, in fact, recreating the environment they see, they’re simply detecting an arrow, line, or object and then replacing it with a pre-created 3D asset in the visualization. Although these reconstructions don’t look as sharp or pretty, they’ll mimic whatever is actually drawn on the road.

For vehicles with AMD processors, you'll see the previously released High Fidelity Park Assist (video below), which does look amazing.

If you’d like to always use High Fidelity Park Assist visuals even when you’re not using Autopark, then you’ll need to disable your ultrasonic sensors and give up the accurate measurements they display.

You can change your setting under Controls > Autopilot > Park Assist and toggle between Standard or Vision.

High-fidelity park assist is shipping this weekend to Tesla customers without ultrasonic sensors as part of the holiday release!pic.twitter.com/MEHL6w003r

— Ashok Elluswamy (@aelluswamy) December 17, 2023

Who Gets the New Autopark

If your vehicle has ultrasonic sensors, then the new Autopark is currently only available on FSD v12.3.6 , which is update 2024.3.25, but since Autopark only requires Enhanced Autopilot or above, it should be bundled with a non-FSD update in the future.

While the new Autopark is only available in North America, it is expected to be rolled out to additional regions in the near future as Tesla continues to test the feature.

If you're not sure if your vehicle has an Intel Atom or AMD Ryzen processor, you can double-check by going under Controls > Software > Additional Vehicle Information. You'll see your infotainment processor listed there.

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