Oh, I do love the mileage computer. It definitely makes me drive more economically.

Love it!! I thought about integrating two paintball guns into the front of my car. They could be aimed with a laser pointer, or for that really high tech look, integrated into a gps display where you could have a lock control like on a fighter plane. Get the jerk who cut you off in your sights, get tone, and BAM! Instant satisfaction. Gun “a” is just a paintball, but for that really obnoxious ahole, gun “b’ has balls filled with brake fluid…

I also want surf and watch DVD’s and HD TV while I am driving.

I WANT ALL THIS FOR UNDER 40K!!!!

I don’t think I am unreasonable. In Japan, they can already watch TV and DVD in their cars. Putting a camera in the front is easy and Nissan already has drives in some of their cars.
BMW will offer internet access in the new 7 series.

I also want: back up camera; keyless go; cooled seats; tire pressure monitoring that shows the actual tire pressure at each tire.

It actually is hard to find a car with all of this.

Agreed. It becomes something I don’t have to fiddle with as the quantity of rain varies. I first ran across it on a rental BMW, and it went straight onto the list of features I wanted on my next vehicle (which I now have).

Do they work now then? The 08 Audi A6 i drove had them and they drove me nuts, they refused to wipe when it only drizzled slightly so i had to tap them manually or have them work way too fast. I used a lot more time fiddling with the settings on that damn thing than i do adjusting the six speed intermittent switch in my Focus.

VW style auto-wipers. Turns on when it rains but more importantly adjusts to the amount of rain falling.

Agreed. It becomes something I don’t have to fiddle with as the quantity of rain varies. I first ran across it on a rental BMW, and it went straight onto the list of features I wanted on my next vehicle (which I now have).

Don’t need power seats, auto-adjust air conditioning, ABS, airbags, automatic transmissions, automatic headlights, electric parking brakes….

Actually… auto-adjust air conditioning can be quite useful. It wasn’t a feature I specifically looked for, but now that I have it, I love it. I always found that on long highway trips in sunny weather, I could never get the air conditioning right. With a couple temperature sensors and a light sensor to determine how much sun is hitting the car, it’s now just another thing I don’t have to fiddle with.

I also like the fact that it’s smart enough not to crank up the fan on a cold winter day until the engine has actually warmed up enough to be producing heat. That’s actually quite convenient.

Best I have gotten to use is heated seats. In Canada, they were so nice. I often took my wife’s car just so I would have those seats.

Absolutely. They start to heat up much faster than the heater, and really help to take the chill off. I used to use a remote starter and let my car idle to warm up (it gets genuinely cold here in the winter), but since getting a car with heated seats, I find I can get away without it.

That means I’m saving the environment, right? :-)

Seriously, though, heated seats. They’ve saved me from a frozen bum on many a winter morning.

Aux-in 1/8″ input on stereo face. Non-proprietary input from ANY device with a headphone jack.

Windows up/down with key in door handle (see VW). Great for rolling the windows up at 10PM after leaving it sitting out in the driveway.

Remote locking & hatchback release.

Cruise with automatic proximity adjustment. Auto-adjusts the traffic speed in front of you. Haven’t driven one but the idea is a good one.

Sunroof.

VW style auto-wipers. Turns on when it rains but more importantly adjusts to the amount of rain falling.

2nd choice would be the variable wiper delay they used in the 90s VW products. Adjustable by turning on the wipers, clear the glass. turning them off and then back on when you are ready for them to clear the windshield again. That time off is the delay period. VERY intuitive. Plug-in upgrade that works in even some of the 70s VWs.

What I like best is that features like this don’t add any real weight to a car. No need for larger engines or mileage penalties. THESE are the kinds of features I’d like to see on more mere mortal vehicles like I drive. Hear that domestics? Not just the $40K halo-cars.

My last feature that I found I like is GPS. I recently bought a Nokia N810 handheld computer. Runs Linux (YAY!). It has onboard maps and talking directions. NEAT idea. Not as good as a dedicated GPS unit I suppose but I have it with me all the time and there is value in that too. Unfortunately most of my destinations are very well known to me so GPS is not a tool I NEED. Got topo maps too…

I want heated seats in a future vehicle.

Don’t need power seats, auto-adjust air conditioning, ABS, airbags, automatic transmissions, automatic headlights, electric parking brakes….

I drive like an old fart on slippery roads and rarely engage ABS. My Dad taught me to drive as if you had no brakes on slppery surfaces–which was pretty much true of the stuff I learned to drive on with their drum brakes and bias-ply tires.

The nifty stuff on my Aztek is all nice-to-have, but not need-to-have, something like my pretty-much stripped air-conditioned Ranger, but with better than low/mid 20s mpg, is all I REALLY need.

My theory is that car manufacturers put electronic locks in their cars just to save money, and have found clever ways to market it. It must be a lot cheaper to just mold a standard bit of plastic and put a microchip in there and have different codes for each car, compared to making several “proper” locks out of expensive metal and make them different for each car.

I completely understand why people want these sort of things, and to be honest most of them will never cause problems. But when they do they are… quite frustrating.

I want to try out one of the new cruise controls with radar, sonar, or whatever that will let you tail the guy in front of you at a comfortable distance. I get sick of ending up in a jam with three other cars trying to sort themselves out on an otherwise empty interstate.

Steel

I can go on about the well thought features that have already been mentioned (multiple airbags, Honda’s magic seats, adaptive cruise control, advanced trip computers, various satellite related technologies… by the way, my family enjoys all these things with the Fit and S500)

But steel is where the real paradigm shift has taken place. Most of the steel used in today’s cars wasn’t even available a generation ago, and the quality and structural strength of it is simply incredible.

Cars drive better, crash better, last longer, and are far more environmentally friendly, because of the steel we use for today’s vehicles.

I vote for moving the bright lights switch to the turn signal stalk. It used to be a metal button on the floor. You’d push it with your foot when you wanted the brights on. The button would rust after a couple years, then you couldn’t get the brights to come on (or go off).