We got the upgrade overnight and tried out FSD today. It was ok but I have a few observations.
Inside the subdivision it seemed to take its cues from the curb. The street is wide enough to drive closer to the center. As you might imagine, the logic will favor the right side of the road when in doubt, as it should. That’s what a human should/do on an unmarked wide road, so when an oncoming car comes along you’re already to the right. Most humans wouldn’t drive down the center, and dodge right whenever a car comes along - though they could?
Making a left turn out of the subdivision it made me nervous by inching forward from when there was on oncoming school bus. It did wait but I wasn't sure why we were moving at all. That’s not new with V12, V11 was the same - though my prelim experience is V12 is more tentative than V11 at stop signs so far. NHTSA won’t allow rolling stops even though most humans do it, so FSD includes a full stop no matter what, and then inches forward to give the cameras a better view. It does seem unnatural to a human, but that’s how it’s supposed to work, it won’t enter the intersection until it’s “confident.” When the car is confident to proceed into an intersection right, left or across depends on how clearly the cameras can see. If there are bushes, buildings or other in the way, FSD will keep creeping until it’s sure enough to proceed. It will err on the side of caution as it should, or regulators and the public will never trust self driving cars. If you think about it, every intersection is a new situation for FSD, even familiar ones can have different traffic, obstacles, visibility on a given day.
It stopped for no reason at a round about. There was plenty of space to go in front of the only oncoming car. I’d have to know more, but I suspect it was again erring with caution. Humans can judge things that FSD can’t (yet), and unfortunately human drivers do unexpected maneuvers that FSD has to account for. Ironically when all cars are FSD, it will work better as FSD cars won’t do crazy things like some humans do. Right or wrong, FSD will defer to human drivers. Finding the balance between too cautious and too assertive for FSD is an art, they’ve improved a lot over the years.
It lacks any concept of avoiding potholes.Yep, speed bumps have been a problem too so far. Not to mention snow and ice plus darkness make FSD a much bigger challenge…
I’ve mentioned it before, but IME FSD is far more cautious with pedestrians than human drivers. A human driver can judge a pedestrian just standing beside the road, FSD has to account for the pedestrian randomly stepping into the road.
It actually did ok going through a 4 way stop.
An addition: FSD V11 occasionally “saw” things that weren’t there. For example, I was doing 35 mph in a neighborhood, and the car slowed to about 25 mph just before cresting a hill - there were no cars in either direction at the time. Not sure what the FSD logic was that triggered the slowdown?
On one stretch of road it didn't know the speed limit it was easy to use the scroll wheel to speed up.
The most concerning thing is that it showed no inclination to slow or stop for a school bus with red lights flashing in the opposite lane. I don't think it noticed and I ended up taking over. A real issue, and one I hadn’t encountered in person or among YouTube experts.
It's interesting but I'm not seeing much actual benefit from using it. You still have to pay attention and keep your hands on the wheel. We'll try it on some longer drives within the next month. Though I think FSD is fascinating and amazing, I wouldn’t pay $12K or $200/mo to have it, not even close. It’s a monumental challenge, and they’ve come a very long way, but it’s not there yet. If they reach a point that FSD works better than a human driver with no interventions, that’s when it will have broader appeal. We have to go through this development phase to get there, no way around it.