In recent days on Reddit, a user has published a post with which he complains about the experience offered by the Google Assistant Guide Mode on his Google Pixel 4a updated to Android 12 and, apparently, he is not the only one to have encountered some problems.
The user in question, Inigox5, claims in his post that he had used Android Auto for at least a year, a solution that, although with some aspects to be reviewed, he considered all in all more than pleasant.
Driving Mode with Google Assistant doesn’t conquer everyone
Then comes the update to Android 12 and the new version of the OS requires users to use the Google Assistant Guide Mode, a solution that Inigox5 finds slow to load from the first use (perhaps due to the hardware equipment of Google Pixel 4a, certainly not comparable to that of a flagship smartphone). But the problems are not only those related to slowness, as the user also encounters other bugs, such as not responding to taps and incorrect loading of the toolbar.
And again, Inigox5 claims that on the initial screen the system has decided to rename home and work in nearby Pubs and Parking, adding that by selecting them the navigation starts only once out of two while the “for you” section seems to open only Spotify and not the item that is actually selected.
Once the navigation is started, the user’s multimedia contents are not always played automatically and, in case it was necessary to do it manually, you would encounter new bugs, such as waiting a couple of seconds for the opening of the app drawer or presses that are not detected. Furthermore, it seems that every time the app dedicated to multimedia content is opened, you are faced with new elements while your favorite songs and playlists must be found manually (with little effort).
In practice, according to Inigox5 (and the many users who responded to his post on Reddit), the Google Assistant Help Mode is not the best solution for those who must actually focus on the road and, even after the bugs found have been fixed, the team of developers should devote themselves to a significant improvement of its interface, in order to make it more user friendly.