The car is growing on me, especially as I have my wife's Leg Outback to compare it to.

Hers is fraught with the tech of the age and, although it's a good car underneath, it is a far too complex package to be survivable in out-of-doors service. That statement goes for not just Subaru, but for all of 'em.

I'm not convinced there ever can be a day when every system in these things is working flawlessly, there are so many and so hurriedly applied.

I can't help but believe these systems are consumer-tested; perhaps the model of 90% reliable and we'll repair the other 10% under warranty is cheaper than employing well-proven components and systems that have been thoroughly tested and the components tested for quality, longevity, and function.

Also true is the incessant demand for more. Her's is pretty much the same car in the 2018 model as the 2010 it replaced. It's the tech-jewellery that has been added, that the consumer base adores, that the trade media trumpet.

Carrying it forward, when I had to have the touchscreen replaced (due to precisely these quality and survivability issues) at a dealer, I took the opportunity to look at the 2025 model. The story is much the same, the salesman waxing lyrical about the tech and not a word about the car itself. Perhaps it doesn't matter any more.

The worrying thing is the tech never lasts long enough to get sorted. The screen doesn't get replaced with a better screen next year, but with a bigger one. No matter it's just as poorly made or poorly designed, it's bigger. More. Shinier. Brighter. Jewellry.

And what of the previous generation's tech? It's like an iPhone. Once the car's brain dies and is no longer supported, the car itself is virtually unrepairable. You won't see one going 300 kilomiles anymore simply because the tech won't last that long and I'm not sure you could strip a car like this of its electronics and have it be made to run in the conventional sense. Disposable. Like an iPhone.

Perhaps the iPhone is the answer. I wonder when someone will suddenly get the brain spark that says the car itself might not need all this intelligence for itself, but could be marketed as nicely drivable in its off-the-forecourt form, but all the tech-jewellery be still available to those who want it simply by linking your phone to it rather than the car have a brain of its own and the dash covered with human inputs that distract one from actually driving.

Mileage displays, maintenance records, music á la Sirius, all those things can be nested in the phone rather than the car. How much tech? Up to the driver, not only how much but what functions appeal. Time for an upgrade? Buy a new phone rather than scrap a perfectly good car, something one could environmentally get behind if nothing else. The car as a peripheral, hence upgradable. Who'd a thunk it?

After all, my phone already has a perfectly adequate satnav in it, I can control it using voice, and the touchscreen would come inside out of the brutal sun or bitter cold every time I leave the car.