Finished R2 demo test drive? Share your review / impressions

[rogunenode]

All the videos so far say R2 is a rocket... BUT they Pirelli's on the 21" - you can hear them complain in the twisties and reviewers have commented on that. And of course, the stock's 20's w/AT tires aren't performance tires. So judging it vs a Model Y will be tough until you can get comparable rubber. And let's be honest neither a Model Y nor R2 are supposed to be track/performance cars

True. I also think you either need torque vectoring or an actual diff for good cornering performance. for a Tri-motor R2 or R3X.

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[AlphaSnowbordergirl]

Just an fyi…Regarding the frunk button, you have to push and hold for a second for it to pop. With the button for the rear glass you do have to push and hold it seems for it to go down or up.
Also, door handles sound so much better than R1 vehicles. Cup holder was the only thing I had issue with…seemed to pop out after pushing in unless you hold it in for a second.

I was playing around yesterday. For me the frunk, it was a quick tap, holding didnt seem to open it. There was definitely a bit of a delay, maybe to give people room or something. The back window we had to press firmly onve to get it to go down but you didnt have to hold and going up you did. Felt you had to push it too firmly. It will take a moment to get what the car actually likes (or I guess I could have asked the staff but they were still trying to solve my first question of where is the 12v battery is). I agree the doors seem quite sturdy to me. Definitely somw things i will have to learn and get used to but I liked the car. I was worried the plastic would feel cheap and was happily surprised it wasn't.

 

[Mos Eisley]

A couple of other thoughts I didn't mention in my longer review.

Just for convenience, I wish the levers to fold down the rear seats were located near the tailgate rather than just on the seats. No biggie.

The navigation/maps functionality and user interface in general is crisp and snappy. Very easy to zoom in out/scan etc.

Using the halo wheel to adjust audio, if you go quickly, the adjustment lagged just a sec. If you scroll slower, no lag.

And finally one thing maybe an R1 owner can confirm? HVAC controls. First, I thought I would hate the screen-based control but have to admit, it's pretty, um... cool faster than manually fiddling with the three vents I have to move in my current car. However, when I tried to turn off one side completely, I couldn't. My wife often closes the vents if I have them blasting. The guys on the show floor said "just press and hold the control for that side to turn it off just like in R1" but that didn't work. They tried it too and it doesn't do that. You can currently only set it to the lowest output which is, admittedly, very low/fine.

 

[Mos Eisley]

I was playing around yesterday. For me the frunk, it was a quick tap, holding didnt seem to open it. There was definitely a bit of a delay, maybe to give people room or something.

I think it's that delay that is confusing people. There's no audio indicator that it's been triggered, at least not that I heard.

 

[AlphaSnowbordergirl]

I think it's that delay that is confusing people. There's no audio indicator that it's been triggered, at least not that I heard.

I agree. Me and another person were trying to open the frunk for a minute or 2. She thought the emblem on the hood was opening it because the delay took long enough that her touching it coincided with its opening. If I had not opened it earlier and watched a bunch of videos, I may have thought so too.

It definitely has quirks you will have to learn. Rivian made different decisions we aren't used to so I dont want to say its a bad choice when there may have been a reason behind it or its my own bias of what to expect. Need some time living with one.

 

[SANZC02]

A couple of other thoughts I didn't mention in my longer review.

Just for convenience, I wish the levers to fold down the rear seats were located near the tailgate rather than just on the seats. No biggie.

The navigation/maps functionality and user interface in general is crisp and snappy. Very easy to zoom in out/scan etc.

Using the halo wheel to adjust audio, if you go quickly, the adjustment lagged just a sec. If you scroll slower, no lag.

And finally one thing maybe an R1 owner can confirm? HVAC controls. First, I thought I would hate the screen-based control but have to admit, it's pretty, um... cool faster than manually fiddling with the three vents I have to move in my current car. However, when I tried to turn off one side completely, I couldn't. My wife often closes the vents if I have them blasting. The guys on the show floor said "just press and hold the control for that side to turn it off just like in R1" but that didn't work. They tried it too and it doesn't do that. You can currently only set it to the lowest output which is, admittedly, very low/fine.

I have not played with the vents in an R2 but the R1 simply tap the vents on the screen you want to turn on or off.

 

[morph860]

Nice drive in St Augustine, FL today. Great vehicle, exceeded my expectations.

Two things I was disappointed in - I thought phone charger was supposed to be Magsafe/Qi. It's not, unless it was user error. It didn't work with my iPhone 15 Pro Max with magsafe case unless I pushed it way to the right. I thought it was going to "snap" into place like a typical Magsafe/Qi.

Did you drive the White one or the Catalina Cove? I can confirm that both of the MagSafe chargers in the White one worked. Didn't try the one in the showroom.

How did you like the St Augustine location? The one in Orlando is closer to me, but St Augustine was much easier to get to. I thought the people working there were very nice and knowledgable. Just seems like a very small location. I was still expecting it to be a lot busier.

Other people in the showroom were struggling with getting the frunk to close. Seems like people were afraid to slam it. If you close it the same way you'd close a traditional hood, it works fine.

Slam it. The showrooms echo so much. It's not as bad as you think. When I was in there, another couple cranked the radio up in the showroom. It echoed so bad in there that everyone looked over at them. They kept saying sorry. The people who worked there just laughed and didn't care that they did it.

 

[Dark-Fx]

I don’t understand the frunk issue - is it worse than a “regular” hood?

Watching the people in the Rivian Space play with it, it was clear nobody quite understood how to do it, including the Rivian reps. I think that is adding to the confusion or consternation of some. The first time I did it, I thought I was doing it wrong. But once you figure it out it's OK. As I mentioned further up the thread, I do think a better gas strut will give the hood a little lighter touch.

It's just different, people aren't used to soft-close hoods. You definitely don't need to slam it.

The gas struts have to be a bit stronger than it seems necessary, because it won't open otherwise when there is a small amount of snow on the hood. It's a really big hood for the size of vehicle since it's a clam shell all the way to the edges.

 

[marffeus]

I test drove yesterday at the Dallas location and confirm most of what's been said here. Sadly the Dallas location didn't have a Catalina Cove, the sales rep said they did get one but had to send it back since the "air vent was installed upside down" lol. That's the color I really wanted to see (luckily they had white and HMG which are basically the other colors besides CC that I'm considering).

Car was really quick and felt fun to drive. I forgot to play around with the different drive modes sadly but plan to take another drive soon.

I agree with the odd lag of frunk opening and the halo wheel audio adjustment. For the Frunk I kept pressing and pressing and finally it opened after I quit pressing but they do need some tweaking here, like an audio chime when it's activated.

Halo haptic wheels were cool but like others have said the "presses" (i.e. left, right, forward or back) are pretty much impossible to do without also including a "scrolling" action input, which can hopefully be tweaked with software.

Audio system was okay, better than expected based on comments but still not amazing. I think mostly just lacks some bass, the sound clarity and sound stage were pretty good. I didn't have time to mess with any settings either.

Back seat room was really nice, along with the rear cargo area.

Overall came away pretty happy but I still want to wait for Costal Cloud to be available

 

[Mos Eisley]

I have not played with the vents in an R2 but the R1 simply tap the vents on the screen you want to turn on or off.

Yup. Wasn’t (yet) working in the R2

 

[tivoboy]

Agreed on the acceleration. I'd be interested to hear feedback from those that drove on the highway and managed something like a 60 to 80 mph pass acceleration.

I did a test drive yesterday and will write up more of the experience later today, but I can confirm the 50-80 acceleration is VERY strong, that band is much stronger than my TM3 RWD LR, But

the on-ramp speed is not as strong, and the off the line is also not as strong.. it does it a bit stronger than my TM3 from ~ 20-40, but not off the line.

I was in whatever the sport mode was, but not launch control and the R2 IS indeed ~ 1000 lb heavier than the TM3 So moving mass IS harder.

In the comfort mode, it’s all just a tad nerfed. Pretty calm off the line, not Driving Mrs Daisy calm but easy. I think my SO would drive in this mode. I would prefer being able to GET TO THE POWER with MORE PEDAL but it’s like the torque band or electrify flow is reduced in Comfort. Makes sense.

 

[Wilber]

In the Rivian R2? No - and as far as I know, R2 is just like R1 - not possible. The USB-C ports are reserved for Gear Guard etc. There are threads here discussing workarounds but they only work when parked. It's been said that Rivian has had it on their roadmap but I'm sure it's one of those things that less than 1% of users actually want so...

In other vehicles? Yeah... sure. But in those cases, some of those cars' speaker/audio systems were mediocre so having better source material really wasn't worth the effort as the end result didn't sound all that much better.

Most people I know (which is very few) who go to the effort to play/load from USB are using low bitrate MP3's so it's not perceptibly better audio in the end. Most average cars sound systems don't have very good DAC/Head units to begin with. It's been demonstrated the average person cannot reliably distinguish between Bluetooth and USB audio quality in general and especially not in a moving vehicle. OK, I think they "technically" can but not in a way that matters to them.

In the end, the convenience of having all the music ever at your fingertips via a streaming device wins over quality. So accepting that compromise, I just want to be able to tune it as good as possible within the limits of the hardware. I thought R2 did this better than many.

ONE OPTION THAT MIGHT BE BETTER: WIFI HOTSPOT

WiFi hotspot theoretically should allow higher bitrates though I've read in R1 that it's limited to standard bandwidths. I didn't get to try it. Maybe somebody here with an R1 has? You could easily set up a shortcut on an iphone to automatically connect through such a hotspot every time you get into the vehicle.

Thanks for the good info. Glad to hear an audiophile like you is happy using bluetooth. So. i will load part of my library on my phone before doing a demo drive. One question about bluetooth in the R2: Has Rivian implemented bluetooth so you can control from the center screen? (and also perhaps from controls on steering wheel) And, if so, how do you find that interface?

 

[Mos Eisley]

Thanks for the good info. Glad to hear an audiophile like you is happy using bluetooth. So. i will load part of my library on my phone before doing a demo drive. One question about bluetooth in the R2: Has Rivian implemented bluetooth so you can control from the center screen? (and also perhaps from controls on steering wheel) And, if so, how do you find that interface?

You can use the haptic wheels for basics like skip forward and back, rewind, volume etc. I was able to see my body lay list and tap on it/select etc …. Through the Music app.

 

[xeddyboi420x]

anyone experience a bit of a lag/slippage when stopping at high speeds? i noticed the car still moving at bit of a jolt when i semi-slammed the brakes... but 95% of the test drive it was great. Is it me or do i need to get used to the brake-by-wire system?

 

[Mos Eisley]

Huzzah!! Scored a test drive for tomorrow.

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