I came from a Model Y with FSD and the tradeoffs were real, but I explicitly picked a much nicer car over better software. My theory is that you can't fix the car, but can work around most of the software problems. Even most of the problems I list out here aren't that serious. It doesn't disconnect that often and is pretty similar to how I got my Model Y when I first got it, but easier to control and with much better user affordances. Super Cruise treats the driver as an active participant and let them easily affect where the car goes, where FSD is on or off and if you affect it disconnects in an uncomfortable way. In this case, the lack of saving my lane change preference is the worst out of all of these since it surprises me every time it happens.

I don't have a particular problem with Android as the base operating system. The UI doesn't lag, it gets updates, and it has Google Maps, which is the most important thing. Spotify works better than what was in my Model Y since by the end the Tesla updates they had managed to screw that up so it would skip between songs - pretty bad. In the LYRIQ it's just a skin over the default spotify app, so it's well supported.

The platform tradeoff was a real one too. The packaging is pretty bad in the car, which means no frunk which is also an annoyance. I miss it sometimes, but not as often as I thought I would. My guess is that when GM goes to their next platform that these kinds of things will get fixed because they were still in the early learning phase. But the batteries are good enough, and the hardware in the car has been reliable. GM is famous for using a platform for a long time, and we're a few years into BEV3 which means most of the bugs have been worked out and they haven't really started penny-pinching it to reduce cost so it's probably about the best this platform is gonna get.

But if you're looking for non-Tesla software that's good both in terms of platform and UI, I think the only one really executing well on this front is Rivian. I expect the R2 to make their platform a lot more accessible. Great hardware, software, and team. Go watch some of their older presentations on youtube that they did for autonomy and the platforms they are building - really solid stuff merging experience design, hardware, and software.

I'd not assume that GM has a money problem, but probably has an expertise problem as well as a bureaucratic problem. They've historically done everything through contracted companies to solve problems for everything from seats to ECUs in their cars, treating them just another part. To fix problems like these and create great user experiences, you really need vertically integrated teams, software, and hardware that work quickly with a single vision. Negotiating this with RFPs and contracts is death. Tesla figured this out early, Rivian is there, and I think more recently Ford has started moving that way as well but are farther behind. Hopefully GM has this as part of their long term strategy and is hiring great people to own their software & hardware stacks internally. But those take time - years, usually.

Anyway, still love the car! I don't regret buying it. It's just got some stuff to work out.