Tesla is producing cars with hardware they indicate will be able to achieve full autonomy.
The new Teslas have 8 cameras instead of 1 camera. It has 3 forward facing cameras. The sideways cameras are in the B Pillar. There is a right, left, and center rear camera. At a high level, the vehicles will not appear markedly different from today. There won’t be any protrusions or mountings on the top of the vehicle. The ultrasonic sensors and forward radar will also be upgraded. The new NVidia computer will be 40x more powerful than the existing computer.
This hardware will be standard on all Teslas made. Consumers can purchase “enhanced autopilot” for $5,000 which is a driver assistance program primarily for highway usage. For an additional $3,000 you can purchase “Full self-driving capability.” These options are on the web site now. So for $8,000 you can preorder a fully self driving car.
Initially these vehicles will have less features than existing Teslas but they plan to reach feature parity in December. Tesla is planning to demonstrate a full autonomous trip from LA to New York by the end of next year.
The goal of this hardware is to make driving 2x safer than it is today. Long term there will be more hardware changes and the goal is to make self driving 10x safer.
Elon Musk said that reporters dissuading readers from using autopilot is killing them because autopilot is safer.
Here is the demonstration video
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