Volvo Sensus Connect and Navigation in the 2019 XC40
Cars
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Today we're taking a look at the dashboard technology and our new long term Volvo X-C 40.
And what we've got in front of us is a nine inch version of Volvo census touch infotainment system.
It uses a four by three aspect ratio screen that sort of rotated into a vertical orientation.
And that gives you plenty of horizontal and vertical space for this sliced up interface.
See rather than giving you icons that take you to different parts of the menu, the verbal system uses these slices and tapping on them brings you to any of the four major parts of the infotainment system.
Things like your map, or the currently playing audio source or even your communication devices.
And then tapping the home button, kind of like an iPad or an old iPad brings you right back to home.
The thing that I like about this vertical orientation is that when you're on a map, you can see more of the road ahead instead of things off to the side of the car that aren't really relevant to your route.
Now while we're on the navigation, you can pop into the destination search right here and you have a one search bar that allows you to search for addresses and points of interest all in one place.
Coming back to the homescreen.
We're on our next slice which is the audio source where you can select from things like satellite radio tuning, FM and AM radio with HD decoding, Bluetooth, audio streaming, and more.
There's a couple of usb ports down here in the dashboard, if you want to bring your music that way.
The rest of the interfaces, your communication and of course, the slice for Android Auto or Apple CarPlay, which are standard on the XC40.
So just plug your phone in via usb and you can bring your own apps and maps on the road.
And it nicely integrates with the rest of the interface, because you still get those other slices up here should you want to use them.
Now you get to the rest of the interface by swiping to the right or to the left from the home screen and that's where things get a little convoluted.
The menu structure is shallow, so you don't have to dive deep into a lot of menus.
But as you can see, there are a whole lot of buttons on the secondary screens, which means you don't really want to interact with that while you're driving because it takes a lot of time.
Maybe just stick to the main screen and then when you pull over to park is where you'll interact with these things.
The left menu is where you'll interact with things like your driver aid features and parking eight features.
And then if you swipe over to the right is where you'll find things like your audio.
Sources vehicle monitoring and of course, the selection of apps.
Overall, it's a really nice using system, it's got a bit of a learning curve.
So you'll want to spend some time with it Park before you hit the road.
But once you do hit the road, it's pretty easy to use.
So there's when you're looking at the technology in the dashboard of our 2019 Volvo XC 40.
And this is the long term we're going to be spending a lot of time with this car over the year so be sure to check back for even more details about the rest of the elements of the
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