Microsoft contracts Siemens VDO for in-car entertainment

Siemens VDO and Microsoft just announced a deal to co-develop in-car entertainment systems and navigation products. The companies will initially develop a multi-media platform to more easily integrate mobile phones and music players into automotive systems. The first products based on the Microsoft Auto Platform are expected in 2009. Now go ahead dear readers, leave us your obligatory BSOD, car crashing jokes in the comments below, mercy not required.

[stens @ Sep 7th 2007 8:38AM]

Will this system be called Drives for Sure?

[2MB @ Sep 7th 2007 8:37AM]

The speedometer gives the 3RoD when the car is overheated.

[Shane Reustle @ Sep 7th 2007 3:32PM]

Warning: a hacker has gained control of your vehicle, please call customer suppor tor send us an email.

Would you like to mark this as a "bad part of town" ?

[Karthik Patil @ Sep 7th 2007 6:54PM]

lol yeah

[LittleJoe @ Sep 7th 2007 8:37AM]

fitting, that interior is as tacky as vista

[Thomas Ricker @ Sep 7th 2007 8:41AM]

@LittleJoe,

That's just a (tongue-in-cheek) mockup, look closely. It's not a picture of the Microsoft Auto Platform by any stretch.

Thomas

[spidernik84 @ Sep 7th 2007 9:28AM]

Actually it's not a mockup, but it's a Fiat 500 interior. The car has been released on the market a few months ago, and it's selling well here in Italy, in spite of featuring a Microsoft infotainment system (that's working averagely well, as far as i read) :)

[jackson @ Sep 7th 2007 11:10AM]

As tacky as Vista? Vista looks a lot better than XP. You probably can't afford Vista - let alone a new car.

[mister XR @ Sep 7th 2007 11:36AM]

Compared to Beryl, Vista is tacky...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZD7QraljRfM

[Dennis @ Sep 7th 2007 8:41AM]

Your car navigation system crashed, please manually return car back to its home location and try to drive again.

[riggs @ Sep 7th 2007 8:39AM]

well it might as well have!

[Grandalf @ Sep 7th 2007 8:42AM]

You have to press ctrl+alt+delete to bring up taskmanager in order to turn off the car, when the "off" button crashes..

[MickeyMoo @ Sep 7th 2007 8:46AM]

The iCar System on the other-hand will look amazing and almost never crash - but you can only fuel up at the major gas station chain with whom Apple has arranged a sweet kickback deal, and the GPS only suggests routes which Steve has pre-approved. Any bay area travel is via 280S because it's more elegant and european than 101

[Isaiah @ Sep 7th 2007 10:14AM]

Now that is comedy.
But your forgot, every year a new better iCar will come out and you need to buy the new one.

[riggs @ Sep 7th 2007 12:39PM]

and also they release another car with no engine to give you more options

[Brian Richards @ Sep 7th 2007 1:42PM]

You'd be forced to buy a new one every year because they would change the fuel at the apple appointed stations to only work with the newer versions.

[Ellianth @ Sep 7th 2007 6:30PM]

And you'll get to purchase all your songs again on itunes so that you can play them in your car.

[Brent @ Sep 7th 2007 8:47AM]

Nice title!

[Peppie @ Sep 7th 2007 8:47AM]

When you try to do anything, like simply unbuckling your seatbelt, the car says, "A safety violation may occur from this action. Cancel or Allow"?

[MickeyMoo @ Sep 7th 2007 8:48AM]

Oh yea almost forgot - if the tire blows out or the battery dies - you can't call AAA, you have to mail the car in for service (average turn around 1 week) but you can rent a loaner at the Apple Store for 700 a week.

[Asher69 @ Sep 7th 2007 9:00AM]

...and we're bashing Apple in a Microsoft post why, exactly?

Oh, right. Because you can. Sorry. I forgot.

Back to the topic at hand: Can I install Virtual Car and run other cars from the Dashboard? Will other people be able to drive my car via Remote Wheeltop Connection? Can I designate group policies for who has access to the cup holders? Will you have to join your car to the Domain in order to park at your company's garage facility?

[MickeyMoo @ Sep 7th 2007 9:34AM]

well cause at 545am it seemed funny, and seeing as Apple is talking with VW on a similar system, relevant enough - and about as fair as all the Apple is the suxor comments that get added to Apple news. Fair and Balanced I say... I'll stop now.

[Brian K @ Sep 7th 2007 8:49AM]

I can see people getting insulted now--"Incompatible driver found."

[garver @ Sep 7th 2007 9:00AM]

So thats when a woman steps in right

[blueeyesm @ Sep 7th 2007 11:27AM]

so, if an 80 yr-old gets in, will the car notify that an updated driver is required?

[Josh @ Sep 7th 2007 6:17PM]

@blue

That is pretty funny, had me laughing there.

[neoAkira @ Sep 7th 2007 8:53AM]

When the car crashes you close all windows...reboot and you're good as new

--or--

Event ID069 - Please contact your system administrator

--or--

Do you want to install updates before shutting down your car?

[NHAnimator @ Sep 7th 2007 8:57AM]

(I hope I never contract Siemens.)

[simmers @ Sep 7th 2007 9:09AM]

Invalid key : please join the Genuine End-User Advantage Rigmarole (GEAR) programme within 30 days to activate your vehicle.

[Marty @ Sep 7th 2007 9:04AM]

I'll have to remeber that everytime I see a red ring of light, it's just a stoplight and not a hardware problem.

[Bad Beaver @ Sep 7th 2007 9:06AM]

Dunno, M$ and Siemens in one product, that is just as good as herpes. I try not to choose M$ in products I intend to use, and I try not to choose Siemens in products where Siemens provided the interface.

[Blah @ Sep 7th 2007 10:39AM]

I just try not to say 'Siemens' out loud, because it makes me giggle like a 3rd grader.

[Matt Noble @ Sep 7th 2007 9:08AM]

'Blue wind-screen of death'?

[Brian @ Sep 7th 2007 9:08AM]

This convergence of tech into autos is terrible, IMHO. For anyone that works on their own cars, you know what I'm talking about. The level of difficulty maintaining these things goesup exponentially when you start merging these complicated systems into cars.Hopefully these new systems are just eye candy and not really tied into the drivetrain or engine management.

[Phil @ Sep 7th 2007 9:08AM]

will it play the windows sound when you start the engine?

[warriorrocker @ Sep 7th 2007 9:13AM]

You first have to wait a minute for vista mobile to check if your fuel pump not only contains microsoft signed drivers but also the preinstalled rootkit ensuring you only use win64 octane fuels. Once it is finished you will greeted by the obligatory overly loud windows start up music, remember how loud you were listening to music when you shut it down yesterday? While your driving you have to deny or allow each turn and lane change, this includes your blinker. The main thing to remember is to save your driving progress as you go. It is entirely possible to suffer a crash and have to start your 11 hour drive all over again. Autosave probably was not enabled or suffered a special unknown error. At least when you get that oh so fun virus you can use system restore, oh wait that would vilolate odometer milage security policies. Easily circumvented of course by renaming odsec32.ocx

All joking aside it will be interesting to ee where this goes, good luck ms.

[Richard @ Sep 7th 2007 7:02PM]

That was gay

[simmers @ Sep 7th 2007 9:14AM]

Actually, this concept is impossible - a car can only have two backdoors.

[josh @ Sep 7th 2007 10:17PM]

oooohhhh... i liked that obe

lmao

[Josh @ Sep 7th 2007 9:19AM]

When speeding or running red light, it would surely let you know that the driver "has completed an illegal operation"

You will need two engines to run the full 64-bit version.

Your breaking may be delayed if you are trying to play music, run your wipers, turn on your lights, and use your GPS at the same time.

[LJKelley @ Sep 7th 2007 11:20AM]

Funnily enough, my BF had a Chrysler back in the day with eletrical issues where the AC or Radio would drain power from the brakes causing him to not be able to break.

But joking aside, I think Microsoft's dedicated OS's like the 360 OS or Windows Mobile are for the most part great, it gets bad on the PC because of all the 3rd Party Software and Drivers. I agree the 360 Hardware isn't the best, but the software had never crashed on me. I can't wait to see where this goes :)

[Rick @ Sep 7th 2007 7:52PM]

ACK!!

[Phil @ Sep 7th 2007 9:20AM]

Vista-GPS-Engine
... arrival delayed ...

[Joey @ Sep 7th 2007 9:21AM]

Of course, this product will have WGA. Hopefully it will contact Microsoft servers before you start driving and not shut off when it realizes your product key is invalid while doing 70 on 95.

[mentalsticks @ Sep 7th 2007 9:22AM]

1. For no reason whatsoever your car will crash twice a day.

2. Every time they repaint the lines on the road you would have to buy a new car.

3. Occasionally your car will die on the freeway for no reason, and you would just accept this, restart and drive on.

4. Occasionally, executing a maneuver such as a left turn, will cause your car to shut down and refuse to restart, in which case you will have to reinstall the engine.

5. Only one person at a time can use the car, unless you bought "Car Ultimate" or "Car Business Edition." But then you have would have to buy more seats.

6. Macintosh is building a car that's powered by the sun, reliable, five times as fast, and twice as easy to drive, but only runs on five percent of the roads.

7. The oil, water temperature and alternator warning lights will be replaced by a single "general car default" warning light.

8. New seats will force everyone to have the same size butt.

9. The airbag system will say "Are you sure?" before going off.

10. Occasionally for no reason whatsoever, your car will lock you out and refuse to let you in until you simultaneously lift the door handle, turn the key, and grab hold of the radio antenna.

12. Every time a new model car is introduced buyers would have to learn how to drive all over again because none the controls operates in the same manner as the old car.

13. You press the "start" button to shut off the engine.

(very much stolen, of course)

[quaipau @ Sep 7th 2007 9:27AM]

Destruction Derby:
iCar
vs.
Microsoft™ TrueValue© Premium Ultimate™® Human Edition© Microsoft™ CarIntegration©® FairUsageAdvantage™€-SiemensVDO Platform for Humanly driven Automotive Vehicles™©®€ [Insert FIAT sticker here][Insert Siemens sticker here][Insert Delphy sticker here][Insert Intel sticker here]

[qtip @ Sep 7th 2007 9:28AM]

The Navy tried putting a Windows OS (NT at the time) in their ships as part of the Smart Ship program and it had one spectacular failure--the USS Yorktown died in the water when its network of NT machines experienced a cascading failure due to a divide by zero.

[JMR @ Sep 7th 2007 9:37AM]

VDO has been sold to Continental, don't blame Siemens

[Nubaeus @ Sep 7th 2007 9:35AM]

The real question is.

Can it drive Doom?

[Luis @ Sep 7th 2007 8:19PM]

ENGADGET! I think you should devote an article on a sketch of cars from the main operating systems windows, linux, and apple. Made from composite comments made by the readers!