Growing up, our version of “rear seat entertainment” was a good game of Punch Buggy or I Spy. Today, it seems kids can’t get out the driveway before firing up some type of electronic device. Hell, I’ve almost driven off the road myself after getting caught up in a movie playing on the rear seat screen in the minivan in front of me. I can’t speak from experience as I don’t have children. However, after talking with a number of friends, they all tell me the concept of rear seat entertainment works. It distracts! With everything the Porsche system has to offer, it should distract like a champ, and then some.
First introduced on the Pananamera Turbo S Exclusive series, the system can now be ordered on all Panamera, Cayenne, and Macan models. Porsche says that the main components of the new Rear Seat Entertainment system are two high-resolution 10.1-inch color touchscreen displays with a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels integrated in the front seat backrests. Remember that word, integrated, we’ll come back to it later.
Features Of Porsche’s Rear Entertainment Option
Porsche doesn’t disappoint when it comes to the systems capabilities. They include:
- integrated DVD player
- 2 USB ports
- an SD card slot
- a HDMI port (you could ostensibly connect a video game console with this)
- a camera for video calls
- sound via Bluetooth and wireless headphones
- an internet browser allows mobile internet access
- an app to send and receive emails on the road
- internet connectivity can be established using your own smart phone or table as a WiFi hotspot
- the Plus version of the system offers an internal 32 GB Flash drive for saving multimedia files
- lastly, if you so choose, with an available app, you can use your smartphone or a tablet as a remote control for the Porsche Rear Seat Entertainment System
That last point above brings up the point I made earlier about the word “integrated“.
I usually like everything Porsche does, but when viewing this new entertainment system in pictures, and thinking about it in the back of a Macan, I have a hard time with calling it integrated. I’ll have to wait and see it in person before making my final judgement, but my first thought upon seeing this was that, other than the deviated stitching, it looks like those systems you can just hook over the back of the front seat. Maybe you would simply be better of handing your kid an iPad and hooking it onto the back of the seat. Sure you wouldn’t get some of the functions the Porsche system offers, but the only one of consequence you would be missing is the HDMI adapter for a game console.
Hopefully, we’ll get a press car in the near future with the system installed and can give you a first hand accounting of it. For now, if you’re interested in one, the feature is available to order on new vehicle configurations and has a MSRP, in the U.S., of $2,590.00, and the Plus version has a MSRP of $2,890.00.