Tesla's Giga Berlin officially opens, Musk delivers speech and first cars

By Jorge Aguirre
Elon Musk delivers a speech at Giga Berlin
Elon Musk delivers a speech at Giga Berlin
Tesla Welt Podcast

The first Tesla vehicles manufactured in Germany were delivered to their owners by CEO Elon Musk, at the official opening of the officially opened Tesla's first manufacturing facility in Europe on Tuesday.

"This is a great day for the factory," Musk said at the handover of the Model Y’s, welcoming the launch as "another step in the direction of a sustainable future".

According to the German journal Auto Motor Und Sport, the Tesla plant aims to produce 2,000 automobiles in its first few weeks of serial production, and around 500,000 cars per year. The new 5-billion-euro ($5.5 billion) plant will not only dramatically increase output but also take some pressure off the other factories in the U.S. and China.

Due to a resurgence of Covid-19 instances in China, Tesla had to temporarily stop down production at its Shanghai facility last week. For at least two days, production of Model 3 and Model Y automobiles built in China was halted.

Elon Musk gave a brief speech at the official opening, thanking everyone who helped make the factory a reality and restating his vision that electric vehicles, solar, and wind power, as well as batteries for energy storage, can solve climate change, claiming that the Gigafactory Berlin is a "big step" toward that goal.

During his address he reassured listeners that "Tesla will make sure that this is a gemstone for the area, for Germany, and for the world."

Tesla's Deep Crimson paint color spotted outside of Giga Berlin
Tesla's Deep Crimson paint color spotted outside of Giga Berlin
tesla_adri/Twitter

At the opening, the Tesla CEO also announced that Tesla is going to be able to offer two new paint colors available at the new factory. He confirmed that "Giga Berlin will have the world’s most advanced paint shop, with more layers of stunning colors that subtly change with curvature."

Tesla mobile app detectives discovered hints of three new colors Deep Crimson Multicoat, Abyss Blue Multicoat and Mercury Silver Metallic in the app code last year. It’s not clear yet which two of these three will be the ones to come out of Berlin.

Tesla's Deep Crimson paint color
Tesla's Deep Crimson paint color
temagazin.de

Tesla has also recently begun manufacture of the Model Y at a new plant in Austin, Texas, but the company has yet to conduct a grand opening for the facility.

Tesla to Add Restricted Driver Profiles for Safer Teen Driving

By Not a Tesla App Staff

Tesla is set to introduce restricted driver profiles in an upcoming update, aiming to improve safety for teenage drivers. Tesla hacker @greentheonly, also known as Green, recently decompiled the 2024.14.3 update, revealing the change.

Restricted Driver Profiles

Over the years, many people have asked Tesla to bring in restricted driver profiles, similar to Tesla’s currently existing Valet Mode. Valet Mode already serves to restrict the car’s maximum speed, reduces acceleration, and disables the use of Autopilot and FSD. The new restricted profiles will let you apply certain restrictions to driver profiles without the full-fledged restrictions of Valet Mode which also limits HomeLink, GPS history and more.

What Restricted Profiles Could Do

From Green’s post on X, restricted driving profiles will display “training wheels” next to the profile, indicating their usage for new drivers. The ability to add a maximum speed and enforced chill mode are expected to be part of the feature package.

Other restrictions that could also be implemented could include disabling the use of Autopilot and FSD, or perhaps requiring certain features to remain disabled or enabled, like disabling “Joe Mode”, frunk or glove-box access, summon, and locking Sentry Mode to active.

Given how easy it is to swap profiles on a Tesla, Tesla would need to prevent a user from switching from a restricted profile to a regular profile. Tesla could do this in a variety of ways, such as tying driver profiles to a key card or mobile device and requiring a PIN code to exit the restricted profile, much in the same way they do it in Valet Mode.

Enhanced Safety Implementations

Additional safety measures could include alerts that notify parents or guardians when the vehicle reaches its destination or exceeds set speed limits. Given that a Tesla can automatically call emergency services in a crash, this could be an excellent feature for ensuring the safety and security of young drivers on their own for the first time.

Release Date

Elon Musk has previously mentioned that FSD V12.4 is being rolled out sometime shortly, and given that Green has found this 2024.14.3, it could be coming very soon. The latest Tesla update being rolled out now is 2024.14.6.

Tesla Intel Vehicles Receive Some of the Visual Updates in Spring Update 2024.14

By Not a Tesla App Staff
callmeKuRue/X

Tesla announced last month that its Spring Update, version 2024.14, would come with visual updates, but that they would be exclusive to the Model 3 and Model Y with Ryzen processors.

Tesla has slowly started rolling out update 2024.14, but until last night, it was only available to vehicles with the Ryzen processor.

We now have our first glimpse into update 2024.14 on vehicles that include the older Intel Atom processor.

Visual Updates

According to Tesla, none of the visual updates would be available on vehicles with Intel infotainment units, however, it looks like those vehicles will be receiving some of the features as well.

The Visual Updates include four items:

  • A new immersive full-screen visualization while parked that features the vehicle front and center.

  • A new media player that has a better layout and includes more controls and a new minimized state.

  • Expandable Autopilot visualizations that are available to everyone include a smaller map in the top-right corner.

  • And a redesigned and more compact drive mode strip for vehicles for Auto Shift, which doesn't apply to Intel vehicles.

New Parked Visualization

This is probably the biggest feature just because it’s executed so beautifully. Unfortunately, it’s not available on vehicles with MCU 2 (Intel Atom)… at least not at this time.

It appears that Tesla may be using a higher-resolution 3D model or different shaders to create this new visualization. This could be the reason for its exclusivity to the faster AMD Ryzen processor. However, it could just take some time for Tesla to optimize it for Intel Atom processors or use a different model that is more suitable for the older processor.

The Model S and Model X are also not receiving this new parked visualization at this time. Although the Model S and Model X use the instrument cluster for visualizations, given the appeal of the new parked visualization, we wouldn't be surprised if it became available on the Model S/X in the future as well.

The Cybertruck already uses the new parked visualization, although it doesn't include an instrument cluster like the Model S/X.

New Media Player

Tesla's new media player on the Model 3/Y
Tesla's new media player on the Model 3/Y

The improved media player that exposes additional controls and has a new minimized state, is arriving on vehicles with Intel processors.

Tesla included the new audio player as part of the Visual Updates that would be exclusive to AMD Ryzen vehicles, but the new media player on Intel appears to look and function exactly like it does on AMD vehicles. If you haven’t seen the new media player, take a look at our in-depth look at Tesla’s new audio player.

Expandable Autopilot Visualizations

The new, expandable Autopilot visualizations are also available on Intel vehicles. Although users with FSD already had full-screen visualizations, Tesla is bringing over additional features. This includes everything we've seen on AMD vehicles, including the new media player, the 'Navigate to' module, and the map preview in the corner of the screen.

For owners without FSD, this will bring full-screen visualizations to Autopilot for the first time. The full-screen visualization will look and function much like it does in Europe. It includes all of the new controls, improved vehicle detection, and the ability to display turn signals, but it won't display everything FSD does, including curbs and drivable areas.

Update: It looks like if you have FSD then you’ll have the new full-screen visualizations, but a user is reporting that he didn’t receive them on his Intel vehicle without FSD.

Other Updates

While Intel-based vehicles aren’t receiving all of the visual updates as expected, they are receiving a lot of the other functionality in update 2024.14, including Audible, Sentry Mode Previews, Trip Progress Bar, Spotify improvements, Better Route Available and many more.

Final Thoughts

Although this update doesn't bring the most appealing part of the Spring Update to Intel vehicles, it brings more than was expected.

The new parked visualization is the most exciting, but arguably least useful aspect of the new update. While it's beautiful and fun to play with, the new media player that features quick access to the most used controls is a much more useful addition.

The improved full-screen driving visualizations being available to everyone with the map in the corner is also a nice addition.

While we're not seeing the new parked visualization available on older vehicles with this update, it may arrive later once Tesla has a chance to optimize it for the slower Intel processor.

If you haven’t checked out Tesla’s new Spring Update, take a look at some videos of the best features in Tesla’s 2024.14. update.

Latest Tesla Update

Confirmed by Elon

Take a look at features that Elon Musk has said will be coming soon.

More Tesla News

Subscribe

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.

Sponsors

Find out how to become a sponsor and have your site listed here.

Although we share official Tesla release notes, we are not affiliated with Tesla Motors. We are Tesla fans and supporters.

Latest Tesla Update

Confirmed by Elon

Take a look at features that Elon Musk has said will be coming soon.

Subscribe

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.