Behold McLaren's bewitching new speedo

Meet the new McLaren Driver Interface. Alright, it sounds like a posh name for ‘dials’, and it basically is. But try watching the video above and not being a little bit bewitched. This will be fiddled with a lot in car showrooms and motor shows the world over…

The Interface sits ahead of the driver in the new McLaren Super Series model, the replacement for the 650S and 675LT which debuts at next week’s Geneva motor show. There will doubtless be all sorts of other tech to bamboozle and amaze us, but this may be the most tactile and instantly gratifying of the lot.

So with the dials (sorry, Interface) in full view, you get an electronic display covering speed, revs, gear selection, fuel info, and heaps more. It looks highly configurable to your needs and desires. Flick the car through its Comfort, Sport and Track modes and the display will change accordingly.

The push of a button, though, will fold it away into ‘Slim Display Mode’, the dials physically moving and slotting themselves into the dashboard, with just a carbon-clad strip of revs and speed left. Neat.

As well as being able to prod the dials away of your own accord with a button, they’ll also automatically fold themselves into the dash when the car is hunkered down in its most aerodynamic mode, presumably because you’ll be going very fast and need as few distractions as possible.

We’re pretty sure, though, that “sorry officer, I was just trying to fold my dials away” won’t fly in a speeding tribunal…

More details of the new McLaren Super Series are here