As with all Tesla updates, a slew of smaller features often go undocumented. If you’re anything like us, you love to know all the little changes in a release.
Below are all of the changes that were included in Tesla update 2024.26 but didn’t make it to the official release notes.
Show Next Preconditioning / Charging Event
If you have scheduled a preconditioning or charging event, Tesla will now show you the next event that will take place.
An event to precondition the cabin will appear at the climate screen's top right corner. If you have set a charging schedule, your next charge time will now show up in the charging menu under Controls > Charging.
Hide Music Services Per Profile
Not a Tesla App
When you hide a music service, the music service/app will no longer show up in the all apps menu. Music search will also not display results for services you have hidden.
With this update, Tesla now saves hidden music services per driver profile. This allows a driver to hide any services they don't use while making them accessible to other drivers.
Your audio balance that controls how much sound goes to each speaker is now saved per driver profile. This allows each driver to save their own preferred listening preferences.
You can set your audio system's balance by tapping on the audio levels icon in the music player and choosing Balance.
Service Center Tips
Not a Tesla App
If you have a Service Center appointment, your Tesla will now display tips on screen when you arrive at your appointment.
The tips will remind you that you can see your service appointment status and review your summary in the Tesla app.
Reduce Fan Speed Hint
Not a Tesla App
As Tesla points out in 'Other Updates,' they have improved the the climate menu by simplifying the screen by removing certain options when they're unavailable and reshuffling buttons around to make them easier to access for drivers and passengers.
Reduce Fan Speed Option
Not a Tesla App
When in Auto, the fan speed may now automatically lower to reduce the sound of ambient noise during a phone call.
This feature can temporarily be turned off under Controls > Bluetooth if you need to prioritize cooling or heating the cabin.
New Key Required Screen
Not a Tesla App
This update introduces a new key-required screen when you try to perform an action that requires a key and there isn't one nearby.
Improved Front Camera Clarity
Not a Tesla App
Video post-processing is now applied to the front camera for hardware 3-based vehicles.
With this update, Tesla appears to now be applying the same techniques to the vehicle's front-facing cameras.
Traffic-Aware Cruise Control Chime
Not a Tesla App
In Tesla update 2021.40, Tesla added the option to receive an audio alert when Traffic-Aware Cruise Control is enabled.
This was an option that could be turned on or off under Controls > Autopilot > Traffic-Aware Cruise Control Chime, however, with update 2024.26, this option has now been removed. With this update, TACC will always chime when the feature is engaged or disengaged.
New Ambient Lighting Options
Greggertruck/X
There are now additional options for your vehicle's ambient lighting. Under Controls > Lights, you can now control the brightness of the vehicle's accent lights. In addition, you can choose for the accent lights to only turn on when the vehicle detects dim conditions outside.
If you’ve seen any other changes in update 2024.26, be sure to let us know.
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Yesterday, we reported that Tesla updated their Steam integration on Model S and Model X vehicles. The update was part of their 2024 Holiday Update, but it looks like there may be more to this than a simple update.
Steam, a video game library app, makes it easy for users to buy or launch games on their computers. However, a couple of years ago, Valve, who created Steam, launched their own standalone device, the Steam Deck. The Steam Deck runs a custom OS based on Linux.
Steam Launch
When Tesla launched the redesigned Model S and Model X, Tesla introduced a dedicated gaming GPU with 16GB of RAM and touted the ability to play top-tier PC games in Tesla vehicles.
In 2022, Tesla finally launched the Steam app for the Model S and Model X as part of its 2022 Holiday Update. The Steam app runs Steam OS, the same OS as the Steam Deck in a virtual environment.
However, earlier this year, Tesla stopped including the GPU and Steam (Beta) in their vehicles, and we haven’t seen any updates to the Steam in quite some time. In fact, we thought Tesla was axing their gaming-on-the-go dreams.
SteamOS Update
The Steam app, which is still in Beta, is getting an interesting update for the Model S and Model X vehicles with the discrete GPU.
Those vehicles received an update to SteamOS 3.6 - the same version of SteamOS that runs on the Steam Deck. While nothing has visually changed, there’s a long list of performance optimizations under the hood to get things running smoother.
Comparing Steam Deck to Tesla Vehicles
Let’s take a look at the Steam Deck - according to Valve, its onboard Zen4 CPU and GPU combined push a total of 2 TFlops of data, which is fairly respectable, but much lower than today’s home consoles. The Steam Deck is capable of 720p gaming fairly seamlessly on low-to-medium settings on the go and is also built on the AMD platform.
AMD-equipped Teslas, including the Model 3 and Model Y, are packing an older Zen+ (Zen 1.5) APU (processor with a combined CPU and GPU). AMD claims that the V1000 - the same embedded chip as on AMD Tesla vehicles (YE1807C3T4MFB), brings up to 3.6 TFLops of processing power with it, including 4K encoding and decoding with the integrated GPU on board.
While that’s not enough for 4K gaming or comparable to a full-blown console or desktop GPU, that’s enough raw horsepower for light gaming and is currently more powerful than the Steam Deck.
The Model S and Model X’s GPU brings that up to about 10TFlops of power - comparable to modern consoles like the Xbox Series X at 12 TFlops.
Steam Gaming for All Vehicles?
The fact that Tesla is updating SteamOS even though the feature is no longer available in any new vehicles could indicate that Tesla is not only bringing Steam back to Teslas but that it’s going to play a much bigger role.
While SteamOS is run in a virtual environment on top of Tesla’s own OS, we could see Tesla bring SteamOS to all of its current vehicles, including the Model 3, Model Y, and Cybertruck. Steam in these vehicles would likely support any game that’s capable of running on the Steam Deck.
We think this Steam update, which includes performance improvements and a variety of fixes, has quietly passed under most people’s radars. This could be a very exciting update for those who enjoy gaming, especially for those who love to do it in their Tesla.
As part of Tesla’s 2024 Holiday Update, Tesla included two awesome new features - Weather at Destination and the long-awaited Weather Radar Overlay. These two features are big upgrades built upon the weather feature that was added in update 2024.26. The original weather feature added an hourly forecast, as well as the chance of precipitation, UV index, Air Quality Index, and other data.
However, this update also added some smaller weather touches, such as the vehicle alerting you if the weather at the destination will be drastically different from the current weather.
Not a Tesla App
Weather At Destination
When you’re navigating to a destination and viewing the full navigation direction list, the text under the arrival time will show you the expected weather next to your destination. You can also tap this, and the full weather pop-up will show up, showing your destination's full set of weather information.
Note the weather under the arrival time
Not a Tesla App
You can also tap the weather icon at the top of the interface at any time and tap Destination to switch between the weather at your current location and the weather at your destination.
You’re probably considering that the weather at your destination doesn’t matter when you’re three hours away - but that’s all taken into account by the trip planner. It will add in both charge time and travel time and show you the weather at your destination at your expected arrival time.
And if the weather is drastically different or inclement, such as rain or snow, while you’ve got sunshine and rainbows - the weather will be shown above the destination ETA for a few moments before it tucks itself away.
Tesla also recently introduced a new voice command. Asking, “What’s the weather?” or something similar will now bring up Tesla’s weather popup.
The weather pop-up above the ETA
Not a Tesla App
One limitation, though—if you’re planning a long road trip that is more than a day of driving, the weather at destination feature won’t be available until you get closer.
Weather Radar Overlay
As part of the improvements to weather, Tesla has also added a radar overlay for precipitation. You can access the new radar overlay by tapping the map and then tapping the weather icon on the right side of the map. It’ll bring up a radar overlay centered on your vehicle. It’ll animate through the radar data over the last 3 hours so that you can see the direction of the storm, but you can also pause it at any point.
You’re able to scroll around in this view and see the weather anywhere, even if you zoom out. It also works while you’re driving, although it can be a little confusing if you’re trying to pay attention to the navigation system. If you like to have Points of Interest enabled on your map, the weather overlay will hide POIs except for Charging POIs.
Requirements / Data
Unfortunately, you’ll need Premium Connectivity for any of the weather features to work, and being on WiFi or using a hotspot will not be enough to get the data to show up. The data, including the weather radar, is provided by The Weather Channel.
As for supported models, weather and weather at destination are available on all vehicles except for the 2012-2020 Model S and Model X. The weather radar has more strict requirements and requires the newer AMD Ryzen-powered infotainment center available on the 2021+ Model S and Model X and more recent Model 3 and Model Y vehicles.
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