Automotive Archive

Nowadays, just about every vehicle on the road has a tire pressure monitoring system (TPMS). They’re actually mandatory on modern vehicles, so they will soon be ubiquitous. A TPMS is exactly what it sounds like; a system for monitoring your tire pressure. When your tires are underinflated – or, less commonly, overinflated – the TPMS sends you a warning. This is the yellow tire pressure …

Car radios have been around since the 1920s. In the early days, they were considered a luxury option. A radio could easily raise the cost of your car by 25 percent, which is hard to imagine today. But as technology got cheaper, radios quickly became standard on all automobiles. By the 1960s, you didn’t even have to ask. People just assumed that a new car …

When you’re on the road, you need your phone to stay charged. There’s nothing like getting to the end of a road trip and having to immediately hunt for an outlet. Not only that, but apps like Waze can drain your battery in a hurry. As a result, many people put their phones on the charger automatically when they get in the car. Makes sense, …

If you’re an Apple user, you’re probably a fan of multiple connected devices. Indeed, their convenient ecosystem is one thing that makes iPhones so popular. You can use them seamlessly with your MacBook, or control your other devices with Siri. But all too often, this convenience has ended where the Apple ecosystem begins. For instance, cars use their own on-board circuitry for GPS, radio controls, …

The “Check Engine” light has to be one of the most infuriating inventions of all time. Like an “undefined error” in a computer program it tells you just enough to worry without saying anything useful. Some Check Engine light issues are urgent, and should be addressed immediately. More often than not, the culprit is a faulty O2 sensor or some other nonsense. But when the …