Gadgetory

hey it's Chris with the verge and in 2014 your car's gonna turn into a smartphone here's why the concept is that you have something very similar to say the App Store on iOS or the Android Market where you download apps from what Chevy is calling the app shop and I can pull that up here and it actually shows me a list of apps that are available this is all coming through a 4G an LTE connection that's attached to the car they have an announced pricing yet but it'll be going through AT&T in the US but if you don't want that connection you can also pair via bluetooth to your phone and use that connection if you want of course Chevy is recommending that you use their connection the idea being that the antenna provides a stronger signal so when you're in a weak signal area you'll still be able to pull in possibly an LTE connection where you wouldn't be able to on your phone once you have the apps that you want you can rearrange them on the screen just like you would a tablet or a smartphone and there are a few that that Chevy has ready to go and will be available at launch you have Priceline tune in the Weather Channel I Heart Radio NPR slacker kaliki event seeker and city seeker you heard me mention a number of streaming radio apps and those actually do pull down over the LTE connection so we'll have to see how pricing goes but if say theoretically 18t uses mobile share for this they'll be pulling out of your regular data bucket you're gonna have to be very careful you can imagine going on a long road trip pandora is playing you're not really thinking about it and the next thing you know you've burned through a couple gig of data so that'll be something that that we have to start worrying about now now a car like the stingray has a number of different displays you have a full-color heads-up display up here you have an LCD and in the instrument cluster and then you have a rather large touchscreen LCD in the center stack of the car these apps only work with the center stack it's a one screen setup it's not pushing data out to the instrument cluster or the heads-up display and you can imagine how that's kind of a safety and security thing they want to keep the apps in the sandbox GM also says that there will be a capability for the apps to have different displays or features available depending on whether cars stationary or if you're driving so that when you're at speed for instance certain complex features that take your eyes off the road aren't available that's not to say that a passenger isn't in the car but still it's a safety thing