<center><img src="http://pictureposter.audiworld.com/31805/center_screen.jpg"></center><p>Here is a picture of the between gages LED display on my 2006 delivered in late February 2006. A fellow 2006 D3 owner pointed out his 2006, delivered in late 2005 has a between gages LED display that is a vertical rectangle that doesn't fill the entire space as does mine.

Anyone else with a 2006 with the vertical rectangular display? I wonder when the change occurred.

I thought the display is wider for vehicles with adaptive cruise control.

My 2006 model year car has a build date of May 2005 and has a VIN in the low 4000 range--the model year typically starts at 0001 and should run up into the low ten thousands on the A8 VIN's. The build date sticker (at the front of the driver's door jamb) really is the best guide for how early or late the model is in a given model year.

When I bought the car, they didn't yet have the owner's manuals for the 2006, so they gave me a 2007 set. The 2007 set shows the newer display. I bought a set of 2006 manuals off of ebay. The 2006 manual shows the older rectangular style, except the picture of the adaptive cruise is clearly internally inconsistent in the manual with the other pictures--not a great picture in the manual, but looks pretty much like the new style display.

Audi's 2006 change points document (in the old Audiworld press archives) for the A8 says "New Design color Driver Information Center." But then the 2007 change point document (for THIS year's current model) says "All A8 and W12 will have a new Driver Information Center".

Thus I'll leave the board four possibilities to kick around:

1. Your fellow owner really has a 2005, not a 2006. The build sticker showing the model year is the definitive arbiter of this.

2. They cut in new displays sometime in 2006. VIN # comparisons would help settle that.

3. Only adaptive cruise 2006's have the new display. Mine has adaptive cruise. Does yours? Does the fellow owner?

4. Only 2006 W12's have the new display. But I don't think you have a W12 so that theory is out.

Finally, did they really change it again in 2007? Their change points document confused me since they describe it in both years.

Meanwhile regardless, the new display, integration with MMI and the steering wheel controls is really quite cool. Way ahead of my 2000 red display in a 4.2 C5, which itself was a big step from before that.

...MPH, not average MPH. but a redundant digital readout. Is yours capable of this? Mine (early MY06) is not.

<center><img src="http://pictureposter.audiworld.com/96470/04-26-07_0639.jpg"></center><p>

i think its more to do with L versus normal wheelbase. L gets more goodies :)


i just wish the cd title would have a scroll option to view the entire title.

I have Adaptive Cruise Control.

The other 2006 does not.

Car delivered September 06
I had an 06 A8L, that had the "older" vertical display style. That car was delivered Nov 05.

Mine is an '05 model (registered in late June '04, and has the wide layout too.

<img src="http://pictureposter.audiworld.com/65024/dsc02446a.jpg">


<img src="http://pictureposter.audiworld.com/65024/dsc02447a.jpg">


<img src="http://pictureposter.audiworld.com/65024/dsc02448a.jpg">

Again, if you have adaptive cruise control, even on the 2004 models, you get the wide display.

as the keyless entry becoming standard, so around about late 2005. This is a sort of educated guess based on cars I've seen, but of course there will laways be some earlier cars that get registered later, so sometimes a 'later' registration year seems to have earlier features.

I believe the wider display goes with the adaptive cruise control. I have seen it on earlier models, but they all have the adaptive cruise.