A row of new Tesla Superchargers are seen outside of the Tesla Factory on August 16, 2013 in Fremont, California. Tesla Motors opened a new Supercharger station with four stalls for public use at their factory in Fremont, California (Photo : Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
Tesla Motors has started rolling out its latest version of Autopilot update for HW2 vehicles (those with updated sensor and computing hardware designed to eventually provide full self-driving capabilities). However, Tesla CEO Elon Musk notes that the update will enter a "non-actuating mode," with the software activation coming soon.
In a Twitter post, Tesla's CEO Elon Musk revealed that its HW2 Autopilot update will be released for download in all vehicles of Tesla Motors manufactured since mid-October 2016. The Twitter post states that "HW2 Autopilot now downloading to all HW2 cars, but in non-actuating mode to assess reliability. If looks good, actuation by end of week."
All Tesla cars with the HW2 kit, including Model S and Model X vehicles, are now receiving the update over-the-air as the company's practice. However, as stated, it will still be under test and maintenance in order to see its real-world potential without any lingering bugs potentially presenting a risk to drivers and passenger, SlashGear reported.
Called "non-actuating mode," the Autopilot update will be riding along with the driver as a silent co-pilot, which should maintain that the running algorithms would respond to road conditions without actually taking control of the steering, accelerator, brakes and other systems.
According to First Post, the new update is the successor of the HW1 version that works with human supervision. In the latest version, the Tesla vehicles will be offered with an improved Ludicrous+ mode by one millisecond. To recall, Ludicrous+ is a one touch acceleration feature that speeds up Tesla vehicles from 0 to 60 mph in 2.4 seconds.
Besides the improved speed acceleration, the new hardware contained in the Tesla vehicles has 12 updated sensors, eight cameras and radar with faster processing. Some of the user options incorporated in the Autopilot HW2 is the ability to drive to a destination without human intervention, drop off passengers and even park itself with the press of a button.
In the meantime, the older vehicles or referred as "hardware 1" that do not support the self-driving software, will keep receiving updates for software improvement.
The Autopilot update for the HW2 models has been in testing with a small subset of cars, a group of 1,000 vehicles receiving the update early for verification purposes ahead of a rollout to the entire fleet. According to CEO Musk At the time, the entire fleet of HW2 vehicles will get the update in a week or so.
