[Aerkuld]

Funny, I was just thinking about this today. We have two cars in the garage which are about as opposite as one could get from that perspective.

My wife's car is a Ford Fusion Plug-In Hybrid - an amazingly nice car to drive, but so packed full of computer wizardry that it takes a week to go through all the on-screen menus and set up the hundreds of personalized features to where you want them. I was washing it this afternoon with the key in my pocket. It didn't like that. I was close enough for it to sense the key, so whenever the water sprayed on the door handle it would try to unlock the car. As the OP said, unlocking the car means turning on all the interior lights, powering up the dashboard and touch screen, and turning the exterior lights on. My exact thought was "This must be killing the battery"

The other car is the 1964 Morris Mini. In stock form it has a speedometer and a fuel gauge. In it's current form it now has a engine temperature gauge and a tachometer. It has no interior light, and everything else is good old manual toggle switches. Most of the time it sits in the garage with the kill switch off, so the battery isn't even connected.

Cars have come a long way. Sure, they're really nice now and far more reliable, but do we really need all this clutter?