NVIDIA's Chat With RTX and the Ford Lightning Owner's Manual

[Jim Lewis]

NVIDIA offers an intriguing AI Assistant to use with their (expensive) RTX 30.. and RTX 40.. GPUs, which can be used for machine learning and AI. The product is Chat With RTX: Build a Custom LLM with Chat With RTX | NVIDIA,

The requirements to use this product are pretty demanding:

System Requirements

Platform	Windows
GPU	NVIDIA GeForce™ RTX 30 or 40 Series GPU or NVIDIA RTX™ Ampere or Ada Generation GPU with at least 8GB of VRAM
RAM	16GB or greater
OS	Windows 11
Driver	535.11 or later
File Size	35 GB

The setup will take up about 100 GB of disk space (my computer has 4.6 TB of storage, with lots of free space).

This product aims to read documents and notes on your computer and then allows you to ask questions about the content. I have more than 270 PDF user manuals and PDF eBooks on my computer and plan to see how useful NVIDIA's Chat with RTX is for querying the content. The data, according to NVIDIA, never leaves your computer. Naturally, the results will not be as spectacular as ChatGPT4 because of the limited processing power available to an individual private user.

I initially tried the product against Paul Thurrott and Rafael Rivera's Windows 11 Field Guide. Chat With RTX worked very well at providing summary overview answers to questions I posed about the book's content. Here are two examples illustrating you have to be careful exactly how you phrase a query to an AI Assistant:

Does Windows 11 have a video app?

Yes, Windows 11 comes with a video app called Movies & TV. It allows you to play rented or purchased movies and TV shows that you've acquired from the Microsoft Store, as well as access content from a service called Movies Anywhere that allows you to access some of the content you've purchased from competing video services.

​

Does Windows 11 have a video editing app?

Yes, Windows 11 includes a video editing app called Clipchamp. Clipchamp is a free and full-featured video editor that allows users to import media, place it on a timeline, edit it, and then export it as a finished video. The app is described in detail in the "Understand the Clipchamp video editor" section of the Windows 11 guide.

In contrast, I obtained far more hallucinatory answers using NVIDIA's Chat With RTX on the Ford Lightning's PDF Owner's Manual. IMHO, the difference is that the Windows 11 Field Guide is a far better written and structured document that's well organized with good summary overviews in and of itself that Chat With RTX can draw upon in providing answers, whereas the Lightning Owner's Manual is more helter-skelter. For example, there are sections with alternating instructions for vehicles with 12-inch Sync screens vs. 15-inch Sync screens.

@Ford Motor Company might want to provide a better-structured owner's manual and the online equivalent of a chat interface for asking questions about a vehicle. The Ford Assistant in the vehicle itself is very hit or miss as to what it comes up with, although perhaps better than Chat With RTX's answers after being fed the 2023 v1.1 Lightning Owner's Manual. Here are some examples that are both ~incorrect (or at least inadequate, IMHO):

How do I set radio presets?

To set radio presets on your Ford F-150 Lightning, you can follow these steps:

1. Press the "Setting" button on the touchscreen.
2. Press "Sound Setting" to access the sound settings.
3. Press "Sound Mode" to access the sound mode settings.
4. Press "Occupancy Mode" to access the occupancy mode settings.
5. To set a radio preset, you can either use the "Direct Tune" or "Browse" option.

Using Direct Tune:

1. Press "Direct Tune" to open the number pad.
2. Enter the channel number you want to save as a preset.

Using Browse:

1. Press "Browse" to access the available channels.
2. Select the channel you want to save as a preset.

Once you have set your radio preset, you can access it later by pressing the "Occupancy Mode" button and selecting the preset you want to listen to.


Where is the spare tire?

The spare tire is typically located under the vehicle in the trunk or cargo area. To access it, you will need to open the trunk or cargo area and locate the spare tire jack and lug wrench. Once you have these tools, you can follow the instructions provided in the owner's manual to remove the flat tire and replace it with the spare tire. It is important to follow the instructions carefully to ensure that the spare tire is properly secured and that the tire pressure is checked regularly.

In the Chat With RTX interface, you can point the AI to the local computer folder you want to read, so you don't have to copy all your data to the official "dataset" folder. The Windows 11 Field Guide is about 350 MB in size (1,089 pages, lots of color illustrations) and it only takes a minute or two to index on an i9-9900K computer running at 4.7 GHz, 32 Gb RAM, RTX 3090 GPU. The Lightning Owner's Manual at ~50 MB takes even less time.

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[Jim Lewis]

Just for comparison, I asked the free version of Microsoft Copilot running in MS Edge about the location of the spare tire, as described in the 2023 Lightning Owner's Manual and got the following:

The 2023 Ford F-150 Lightning owner's manual provides clear guidance on the spare tire location. To access the spare tire and jack, follow these steps:

1. Lift and remove the carpeted cargo area floor in the trunk.

The spare tire is conveniently stowed beneath the cargo area floor, ensuring that you can quickly access it when needed2. Remember to consult your owner's manual for any additional details or specific instructions related to tire maintenance and replacement.
Please note that the factory spare tire is mounted on an alloy wheel, although it is a limited-use spare3. Always refer to the official documentation for accurate information and limitations4.
Source(s)
1. How do I change the tires? - Ford
2. Can full size tire be stored under the truck in place of the factory ...
3. The Official Ford Support Site | Ford Owner Support
4. 2023 Ford F-150 Lightning Owner Manuals

and here's what Google's Gemini running in Google Chrome says when asked the same question:

What does the 2023 Ford Lightning owners manual say about the location of the spare tire?

The 2023 Ford Lightning does not come equipped with a spare tire as standard equipment. This is because the vehicle is an electric truck and the placement of a spare tire would significantly impact battery pack size and overall range.
The owner's manual acknowledges this on page 298, stating: "Note: Your vehicle is not equipped with a spare tire." [Source: 2023 Ford F-150 Lightning Owner's Manual]
Instead, the Ford Lightning relies on features like:

• Ford Roadside Assistance: This program offers 24/7 roadside assistance for a certain period or mileage, which may include towing to a Ford dealership in case of a flat tire.
• Tire Sealant Kit: Some models may come with a tire sealant kit as part of the optional equipment. This kit can be used to temporarily seal small punctures and allow you to drive to a repair shop.

It's important to consult your specific owner's manual or contact your Ford dealership to confirm whether your vehicle came with a tire sealant kit or if roadside assistance is included.

 

[bmwhitetx]

Bitcoin, Blockchain, AI; always something changing the world. Saw a $100 toothbrush in Costco ad that has AI. Or a golf club with AI features. Huh?
Sheesh, glad I'm retired and don't have Marketing ask me how I can make our electricity AI enabled.

 

[Randall Stephens]

I’m having the AI assistant at work write a novel about the Oregon Trail. True story. Things are a bit slow at the moment.

 

[Jim Lewis]

Amazon owns the Ring device company. Since the acquisition of Ring, the "intelligence" of image processing has been improved a lot, even for older Ring devices (one thing AI is particularly good at). You can set a Ring video device to alert you when it detects that a package has been left at your doorstep, and it's pretty good at doing that and not issuing false alerts. It would be nice to see more image-processing smarts from our truck sensors, but this may only be possible in future model years...our trucks are probably pushing the limits of their processor power and connection bandwidth...

 

[Jim Lewis]

Sheesh, glad I'm retired and don't have Marketing ask me how I can make our electricity AI enabled.

Theoretically, Ford could apply a little AI to your GPS data to let you know when it thinks your truck has been stolen...

As our house is getting on in years, we decided to try a Moen FLO meter. Moen thought enough of the device to buy the startup company. It uses AI to learn your usual patterns of water usage. If the cloud service detects unusual usage, you get an alert on your smartphone, and if you don't respond in a set amount of time, the FLO valve will cut off the water supply to your house (you can reverse it from the app). The device is still in LEARN mode for us. The main thing is the device seems to physically break too frequently. We'll see.

Everyone would like to have a butler, maid, admin assistant, etc. An AI assistant doesn't have to be that smart for many tasks. Just able to learn from patterns and be reliable. With better processors and sensors, AI may be able to drive a lot better than many human beings by always paying attention, not getting bored, tired, or suffering from road rage, etc.

Edit_Update:

Theoretically, Ford could apply a little AI to your GPS data to let you know when it thinks your truck has been stolen...

Seems like that's what Ford's doing with the new 2024 Stolen Vehicle Report: https://www.f150lightningforum.com/...ger-locations-now-available.18561/post-373169

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