[JSpira]

Please only take this poll if you regularly drive a car with iDrive - danke!

[TheAcAvenger]

Somewhere in between an hour and a few days. I could do the basic stuff right away (mp3 cds, basic nav, bluetooth). Using nav by info, some of the car accessories came along later. The lack of other radio buttons on my car still peeve me. I've started using the voice command to switch from radio to sat to cd though, that helps alot.

[Year's_End]

^+1 to everything he said.

[ZuerstBMW]

To use the whole system, about a month. To use the basics, about a couple days.

[CnoteMD]

I spent about 30 minutes in the dealer parking lot to get everything set to my preference, then proceeded to program my home address and used the navigation to direct me home.

I started taking random back roads since the main ones were very backed up with traffic. It was an amazing feeling after purchasing my first BMW to come home and hear the car tell me "You have arrived!".

Back to the original topic, it didn't take much time at all for me to get used to iDrive.

[SteveInNC]

A few days, but I keep "discovering" things (I've had the car about a month). I just started messing with voice control and by calling for a radio preset discovered that the Sirius unit has its own set of presets in addition to the six buttons on the head unit. Yes, I RTFMed when I got the car, but there is way too much gadgetalia in here to remember it all at first reading.

I really like that you can pull-hold the iDrive control and it will go back to the last screen for that particular function quadrant. I usually leave mine in Entertainment on the Sirius radio, but pull into Navigation/Traffic Info before I leave work to see what kind of traffic disruptions are pending.

[zenmaster]

This poll is reminiscent the ridiculously meaningless polls the CNN website tends to have.

[Raayman]

Originally Posted by SteveInNC

A few days, but I keep "discovering" things (I've had the car about a month). I just started messing with voice control and by calling for a radio preset discovered that the Sirius unit has its own set of presets in addition to the six buttons on the head unit. Yes, I RTFMed when I got the car, but there is way too much gadgetalia in here to remember it all at first reading.

What imo is extremely useful is the "options" command that tells you which options you have in the current screen. I wish my dealer had told me that a bit sooner. Overall I have to say that first use was quite quick, but it took a few days/weeks before getting an overall comfortable feeling for the iDrive.

[LEDZEP]

Originally Posted by zenmaster

This poll is reminiscent the ridiculously meaningless polls the CNN website tends to have.

You won't think so after you see that Mr. Spira is almost certainly using this poll as legitimate research for a white paper or article of some kind.

Jonathan seldom posts "hey, I was just curious" type threads.

[zenmaster]

The meaning of "get used to" is subjective. For example, one can understand the principles of how iDrive operates and navigate quickly in about a minute. Yet at the same time particular submenus that provide functions may be unknown for months.

[bud001]

Pretty much the moment i left the dealership. The more nuanced issues comes later (voice dialing, for example, because i didnt get a bluetooth phone until later) but the general controls are clear to me from almost the get-go.

As for the setup items (lights, air vents, etc) i set them up from day 1. I just parked my car and move around the menus until i found what i like.

Of course, before i picked up my car i went to look at the "video manual" on the website.

[TopDown]

Read the [electronic] owners manual before we took delivery of the car. First morning spent 20 minutes playing with it - that got me 80% of the way there. Been practicing and refining technique ever since.

Wife picks it up intuitively.

[Crazy Bimmer]

Took a week.

Now i dont even use the shortcut buttons, I go through Idrive for everything as if it comes naturally.

[Lassaxi]

I'd say it took about half an hour to learn the basics at the Munich ED center, a few hours to acclimate to using the interface, and a month or two to get to the point where I now finally understand the logic behind how the menus are set up, have voice commands memorized, and can generally do anything I want on the fly without looking at the screen.

Like anything else, it takes a little getting used to. Now I'm so used to it that I find myself getting frustrated when I drive in another car and have to resort to finding old-fashioned buttons to do what I want instead of just using a control knob.

[SteveMD]

I checked 'half an hour' however as I have voiced in various other threads, I sometimes give up with programming the Nav.

It may be because I am spoiled with a Garmin in two of my other vehicles - a cheap on and a very expensive one. Boith are brilliantly simple.

Please please BMW, bring out a hybrid touchscreen/wheel controller iDrive and put a big button on the screen labelled 'Where To'

Another suggestion, once you start a series of voice commands, display the options for the next command briefly on the screen.

All in all though, I wouldn't have any $40K + car including a BMW without a Nav and yes, my next BMW will have iDrive (so please fix it by Jan 2009).