Welcome to ‘Virtual Cockpit’

Get behind the wheel of a ’15 Audi TT roadster and experience the latest in instrument-cluster technology.

The TT is a small, relatively low-volume sports car; only 2,053 were sold in the U.S. last year.

But for NVIDIA, Corp., based in Santa Clara, CA, it represents a major leap forward. NVIDIA’s Tegra graphics processing units lie at the heart of the TT’s advanced digital instrument cluster while actual functions are triggered by other NVIDIA processors.

How advanced? For starters, all information is graphically displayed directly in front of the driver on a screen 12.3 ins. (31 cm) wide, eliminating traditional hardware and creating a “virtual” environment.

The display includes the tach, speedometer and typical information such as fuel levels, but also myriad additional functions for navigation, cellphone, radio and media. Google Earth 3-D graphics are incorporated in the display and can be easily manipulated to check on road conditions or locate a specific address or place.

To display the contents quickly and reliably, Audi is the first automaker to use the quadcore Tegra 30 chip from the Tegra 3 series from NVIDIA. The graphics processor generates 60 frames per second and ensures the needles of the speedometer and rev counter are displayed with absolute precision.

The speedometer, tach and other conventional driver information can be downsized to make more room for navigation or infotainment functions when desired.

Unlike most systems now widely used, the TT eliminates the display screen mounted in the center stack or above it. Everything the driver needs or wants to know is in the virtual instrument cluster in front of him and visually accessible and controlled by switches on the steering wheel and a single rotary knob on the console.  

Voice control also is included. “You can operate almost all functions without taking your eyes off the road,” says Dan Shapiro, NVIDIA senior director-automotive.

Although the TT is heralded as a major advance in visual driver-information systems and controls, it may serve as only the beginning of a trend that ultimately will see cars becoming “the most powerful PCs in the world,” says Shapiro.

Computer power, of course, is the key to the self-driving cars under development by automakers and tech companies such as Google.

NVIDIA’s technology also can link the vehicle to the “cloud,” where vast amounts of information is stored.  By ganging together processors, the car can become a supercomputer rivaling the fastest in the world today, Shapiro says, although costs currently are prohibitive.

Some 6.2 million cars worldwide now use NVIDIA’s processors for various functions, and millions more are found in smartphones and tablets. Its on-board-vehicle GPUs are used by 20 European auto makers, but the company has been less successful so far in winning business from leading Japanese and Detroit-based automakers.

Electric-car producer Tesla, however, is a key customer. The Tesla Model S features a 17-in. (43-cm) graphic touchscreen replacing “all buttons, switches and knobs,” Shapiro says.

It also can trigger functions remotely and has software that can adapt air suspension to various heights depending upon road conditions. “Tesla is extremely innovative,” he says. “Everyone is watching them.”

Efforts by U.S. automakers to plunge more deeply into the virtual club have been hampered by poor results in the early going, with systems that are difficult to use and can cause unsafe distractions. Each is pursuing more user-friendly infotainment systems, “but none of the domestics has disclosed what it’s working on,” Shapiro says.

NVIDIA says automotive remains a relatively small portion of its more than $4 billion annual global business, but last year it established an automotive business office in Ann Arbor, MI, to be closer to U.S. automakers. It also reportedly is close to winning a contract from a Japanese automaker.