Teslas with AP 2.0 to need camera upgrades for FSD

Tesla entered into the car industry with their first EV, the original Tesla Roadster. It was more of a proof of concept as Tesla had bigger plans. Tesla's plan to enter the automobile market was to build an expensive, electric sports car that would have high margins and prove to the world what EVs could do.

Tesla planned to minimize their effort by focusing only on the electric components of the car, such as the drivetrain and battery. They would try to leverage other parts from existing auto manufacturers such as Lotus.

However, in the end Tesla ended up creating most of the parts themselves. The final Roadster utilized as little as 7% of the same parts as the Lotus Elise.

Tesla to replace cameras on Teslas with AP 2.0

Tesla didn't make the same mistake again. When they manufactured the Model S in 2012 they decided to build the car from the ground up themselves. The original Model S didn't have any driver assist features. It's hard to say whether Autopilot wasn't something Tesla had started developing yet, or whether they planned to start small and add to the car in later years.

In September 2014, Tesla introduced their first version of Autopilot. Tesla built the hardware, but left driver assist software up to MobilEye, a company that still focuses on creating driver assistance systems today.

With the introduction of Autopilot 2.0 in 2016, Tesla decided to ditch MobilEye and take their platform in-house. It was a sudden and messy breakup, but in the end it was the right decision for Tesla. Autopilot 2.0 took several years before catching up to the capabilities of AP 1.

Since the introduction of AP 2.0, Tesla has offered a FSD package. Many features were not available out of the gate, but Tesla has slowly developed more features that fall into their FSD package.

Although many features have come out as part of the package such as lane keeping, lane changing, Navigate on Autopilot, Smart Summon, Autopark and more, Tesla is still developing its true self driving system. The problem has been more difficult to solve than anybody in the industry realized. Tesla is now making great progress with their latest FSD Beta releases.

Since AP 2, Tesla has used different hardware such as cameras and processors, but camera placements have remained the same. Tesla wanted to keep camera placement consistent across their product lines. From the beginning Tesla developed these cameras and processors to be easily swappable when better technology comes along.

AP 2 Cameras to be Swapped

Autopilot 2.0 cameras had a filter that made it able to absorb more light but it reduced colors captured. At the time Tesla thought this trade off would be worth it, but they now realize that it's better to bring the cameras in line with the ones used today. Since the cameras were made to be swappable if needed, Tesla can go in and swap them out for the same cameras that are used today.

Don’t worry, Tesla prepared for this.

The cameras just pop right off and can be replaced with the latest model.

Super smart, right? @elonmusk pic.twitter.com/DTRoGSnHhx

— Whole Mars Catalog (@WholeMarsBlog) October 22, 2021

This is exactly what Tesla is doing. Any Tesla that has FSD and AP 2.0, Tesla will be replacing the camera modules with cameras in 2021 vehicles. The FSD computer will also be replaced with the FSD HW 3.0 computer.

Tesla is planning on introducing a HW 4.0 FSD computer with the introduction of the Cybertruck, but this computer is not meant for FSD 3.0 vehicles. Tesla beleives they can achieve FSD on 3.0 hardware, but 4.0 will give them some extra processing power to increase safety even more.

Yeah, although early production cars will need camera upgrades, as well as FSD computer (all included in the price)

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 22, 2021

The same will be true if Tesla realizes that 4K or wide-angle cameras are needed in the future. These cameras are relatively inexpensive and Tesla can swap out the hardware if needed in order to achieve FSD.

Elon confirmed on Twitter that all vehicles with FSD and AP 2.0 will indeed need to have their cameras replaced in order to get FSD on city streets. The amount of vehicles released with AP 2.0 was relatively small as Tesla soon moved to AP 2.5 roughly a year later.

Elon didn't mention any timeframe on when Tesla will be updating these cars but Tesla may be waiting for Tesla service demand to be reduced. The demand for Tesla service is at an all time high as the world starts to get back to some form of normal and there has been pent up demand for service as people are addressing issues from the past year.

When Tesla gets to updating these vehicles with newer cameras and FSD computers, there will be no cost to owners as the replacement will be completely free.

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Tesla’s Optimus Robot Learns to Walk Without Vision [VIDEO]

Optimus Falls - but catches itself!

Not a Tesla App

Tesla recently showed off a demo of Optimus, its humanoid robot, walking around in moderately challenging terrain—not on a flat surface but on dirt and slopes. These things can be difficult for a humanoid robot, especially during the training cycle.

Daily walks help clear your mind pic.twitter.com/dUsW58trS6

— Tesla Optimus (@Tesla_Optimus) December 9, 2024

A Look Behind the Curtain

Most interestingly, Milan Kovac, VP of Engineering for Optimus, clarified what it takes to get Optimus to this stage. Let’s break down what he said.

Optimus is Blind

Optimus is getting seriously good at walking now - it can keep its balance over uneven ground - even while walking blind. Tesla is currently using just the sensors, all powered by a neural net running on the embedded computer. 

Essentially, Tesla is building Optimus from the ground up, relying on as much additional data as possible while it trains vision. This is similar to how they train FSD on vehicles, using LiDAR rigs to validate the vision system’s accuracy. While Optimus doesn’t have LiDAR, it relies on all those other sensors on board, many of which will likely become simplified as vision takes over as the primary sensor.

Today, Optimus is walking blind, but it’s able to react almost instantly to changes in the terrain underneath it, even if it falls or slips. 

What’s Next?

Next up, Tesla AI will be adding vision to Optimus - helping complete the neural net. Remember, Optimus runs on the same overall AI stack as FSD - in fact, Optimus uses an FSD computer and an offshoot of the FSD stack for vision-based tasks.

Milan mentions they’re planning on adding vision to help the robot plan ahead and improve its walking gait. While the zombie shuffle is iconic and a little bit amusing, getting humanoid robots to walk like humans is actually difficult.

There’s plenty more, too - including better responsiveness to velocity and direction commands and learning to fall and stand back up. Falling while protecting yourself to minimize damage is something natural to humans - but not exactly natural to something like a robot. Training it to do so is essential in keeping the robot, the environment around it, and the people it is interacting with safe.

We’re excited to see what’s coming with Optimus next because it is already getting started in some fashion in Tesla’s factories.

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Is Tesla Close to Licensing FSD? GM Quits Cruise, BMW Praises Tesla

Not a Tesla App

In a relatively surprising move, GM announced that it is realigning its autonomy strategy and prioritizing advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) over fully autonomous vehicles.

GM is effectively closing Cruise (autonomous) and focusing on its Super Cruise (ADAS) feature. The engineering teams at Cruise will join the GM teams working on Super Cruise, effectively shuttering the fully autonomous vehicle business.

End of Cruise

GM cites that “an increasingly competitive robotaxi market” and “considerable time and resources” are required for scaling the business to a profitable level. Essentially - they’re unable to keep up with competitors at current funding and research levels, putting them further and further behind.

Cruise has been offering driverless rides in several cities, using HD mapping of cities alongside vehicles equipped with a dazzling array of over 40 sensors. That means that each cruise vehicle is essentially a massive investment and does not turn a profit while collecting data to work towards Autonomy.

Cruise has definitely been on the back burner for a while, and a quick glance at their website - since it's still up for now - shows the last time they officially released any sort of major news packet was back in 2019. 

Competition is Killer

Their current direct competitor - Waymo, is funded by Google, which maintains a direct interest in ensuring they have a play in the AI and autonomy space.

Interestingly, this news comes just a month after Tesla’s We, Robot event, where they showed off the Cybercab and the Robotaxi network, as well as plans to begin deployment of the network and Unsupervised FSD sometime in 2025. Tesla is already in talks with some cities in California and Texas to launch Robotaxi in 2025.

GM Admits Tesla Has the Right Strategy

As part of the business call following the announcement, GM admitted that Tesla’s end-to-end and Vision-based approach towards autonomy is the right strategy. While they say Cruise started down that path, they’re putting aside their goals towards fully autonomous vehicles for now and focusing on introducing that tech in Super Cruise instead.

NEWS: GM just admitted that @Tesla’s end-to-end approach to autonomy is the right strategy.

“That’s where the industry is pivoting. Cruise had already started making headway down that path. We are moving to a foundation model and end-to-end approach going forward.” pic.twitter.com/ACs5SFKUc3

— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) December 10, 2024

With GM now focusing on Super Cruise, they’ll put aside autonomy and instead focus solely on ADAS features to relieve driver stress and improve safety. While those are positive goals that will benefit all road users, full autonomy is really the key to removing the massive impact that vehicle accidents have on society today.

In addition, Super Cruise is extremely limited, cannot brake for traffic controls, and doesn’t work in adverse conditions - even rain. It can only function when lane markings are clear, there are no construction zones, and there is a functional web connection. 

The final key to the picture is that the vehicle has to be on an HD-mapped and compatible highway - essentially locking Super Cruise to wherever GM has time to spend mapping, rather than being functional anywhere in a general sense, like FSD or Autopilot.

Others Impressed - Licensing FSD

Interestingly, some other manufacturers have also weighed into the demise of Cruise. BMW, in a now-deleted post, said that a demo of Tesla’s FSD is “very impressive.” There’s a distinct chance that BMW and other manufacturers are looking to see what Tesla does next. 

BMW chimes in on a now-deleted post. The Internet is forever, BMW!

Not a Tesla App

It seems that FSD has caught their eyes after We, Robot - and that the demonstrations of FSD V13.2 online seem to be the pivot point. At the 2024 Shareholder Meeting earlier in the year, Elon shared the fact that several manufacturers had reached out, looking to understand what was required to license FSD from Tesla.

There is a good chance 2025 will be the year we’ll see announcements of the adoption of FSD by legacy manufacturers - similar to how we saw the surprise announcements of the adoption of the NACS charging standard.

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