I'm wanting to upgrade the whole MCU2 but I'm scared of making my car into a (unique) snowflake. I've seen some reports of problems after-upgrade. Can anyone confirm that they did the upgrade, but it didn't cause new weird problems?
Right now, the software team has to validate their releases against my car, because I'm 1 of 150,000 and if they screw something up, they have to fix it or else Tesla gets 8 Million service requests.
If I upgrade, I become 1 of (dozens?) that have an old car with a new MCU2. If Tesla designed the architecture right, that won't matter because it's more like "I become 1 of millions with MCU2". I just don't have high confidence. (Tesla refuses to fix problems unless they affect lots of people; my yellow ringed MCU1 is testimony to that)
Anyone upgraded and happy with it now?
I have a 2012 Model S - VERY EARLY VIN - so I hear where you are coming form regarding "snowflake" and issues. My options at the time were limited so I did the upgrade to fix the emmc issue and some minor bubbling.
I had mine upgraded in June and it went without a hitch. No residual problems. From that perspective, I think you can rest assured that upgrading in an older vehicle is not a problem for Tesla.
Am I happy that I upgraded?
I lost audio performance and backup-camera visibility is poor. Tesla made some limited attempts to fix both, but they are nowhere near where they were with MCU1 - I just had to get used to it. Happy that the car works again? Yes, Happy with the upgrade? Not particularly as it cost met $2,500 and I lost functionality I cherish and gained functionality that has no value to me.
Did I gain anything?
I can now play games, and watch Netflix, but I use my car to drive, not play games or watch TV.
My year Model S did not have many of the bells and features that MCU2 show off MCU2's abilities such as autopilot visualizations, backup sensors, sentry mode etc, so all of that is lost on me. I also was lucky enough to not have any issues with the browser, so I don't notice an improvement there either. (maybe a little bit, but it's so rarely used, not a game changer in my case).
Additional thoughts
I think if I had a newer model S, one with more features to begin with, I'd be happier with the MCU2 trade-offs.
But I am very happy with the work Tesla Service did - they got it installed and upgraded on my old vehicle in one visit with no lingering issues other than the sound and camera - which are not issues related to my specific install, but rather affect all MCU2 upgrades.
Hope that's helpful to you!