The Buick Reatta Was a 1980s High-Tech Marvel 

Behold - the glorious touchscreen! This is one of my favorite recent videos. Enjoy!

1989: touchscreens are the future! 2020: give us our knobs and switches back!

Imagine a touchscreen from 1988 that has less lag than a modern Range Rover

I hope the team who designed the tech in this car was alive to see their ideas, not just reimagined, but become the standard decades later.

That touch screen was one of the most impressive old car tech items I've ever seen in a car.

That display is incredible for that time period.

Doug gets pulled over: “THIS... is my license and registration”

A touchscreen in an 80s car that actually works ok? I'm genuinely impressed. Almost gives this buick the aethetic of a futuristic flying car on the set of blade runner.

I had an '89 Reatta, and absolutely loved it. If you think of it as more of a personal luxury car and not a sports car, it fulfilled its purpose fairly well. It was comfortable, interior was quiet, and and it had no shortage of features. One thing I dabbled with is a secret menu on the CRT that allows you to view sensor data and provide override control of certain switches/solenoids, which was extremely helpful for troubleshooting. If the car was RWD with the GNX 3.8L turbo power train, I think it would have really taken off. Unfortunately, it would have been too much competition for the Corvette, and GM couldn't allow that.

Car: has more responsive touchscreen controls than half modern cars Doug: Rear lightbars are making a comeback in modern cars so one could say the Reatta's design was ahead of its time.

As a programmer, I am so impressed with this touch screen, whoever did this must be an old master today, outstanding!

He kept talking and talking about the technology of the car. I was like: "there's probably nothing in there that would impressed me..." first quirk and features: "A factory installed, working touch screen without input delay in the 80's." Fuck me!

That 3.8 six, was one of the most reliable engines ever offered...many people have achieved 300,000 miles on that nice engine.

This is the kind of content I'm subscribed for, rare forgotten cheap cars

A few details that were missed on the review: -Mid gate trunk access (Ski Door), the door also uses the same handle than the storage compartments and glove box, but its operated with the key, the handle doesn't work. -In cabin luggage holder strap clips, for even larger hauling capacity. -Plastic front fenders -If you leave the "TEST" button pressed you are gifted with "The Light Show" which makes the gauges lights blinks in patterns while the numbers count from 00 to 99 in a very unique way. -Unfortunately this model wasn't equipped with the "16 Way" power seats which include power adjustable leg rest and lumbar support. -Touchscreen's MEMORY function, allowed to recall your favorite Radio station and Air conditioning settings for two different drivers, not sure if the seat's position was also stored on this memory. -The Reminder actually allows you to write full sentences like "GO BUY LAUNDRY DETERGENT" or whatever. -The "Emergency Brake" on the floor reads "PUMP TO SET" which means yo have to give it two to three pumps to set it firm. Then you can pull the lever to release it. -On some models, instead of just the Fog Lamp and Lamp Retract buttons on the bottom of the console, they had the "Fuel Access", "Trunk Access" but most importantly, a "Glove Box" button that made the glove box lid pop open. -The front "Dome Lights" were in the rear view mirror and can be turned on manually individually to be used as map lights. -All the dashboard, center panel and door trim bezels are made of real brushed aluminum. -The entire perimeter of the interior of the car is surrounded by a wrap around trim made to simulate a sail boat's cockpit, hence the car's name "Reatta" which was some mispronunciation of Regatta (A sail boat's race). -Illuminated key holes on doors. -If you are outside of the car while its locked and you pull the door handle, the keyhole and dashboard lights up, maybe to scare thieves I guess. -If you open the rear trunk with the key it still uses an electric latch popper, so if your battery is dead you can't open the trunk. -Also, if the electronic fuel door fails, there's a secret in trunk button and sticker showing how to manually open the fuel door. -The large doors open so wide that they have White and Red warning lights to make sure other cars can see them and don't hit your doors when you are parked on a curb. Loved the review, glad to see these cool obscure cars getting the love they deserve.

The interior is pretty cool, but that exterior styling is actually really neat too. Especially that taillight bar.

I love how the physical button on the infotainment unit is labeled "GAGES" instead of "GUAGES."

4:14 when I see "2020" written in that font on that screen it doesnt feel like thats today but instead some dystopian sci fi future

Fun fact if you go to the climate screen and hold down the temperature up arrow and off button and it will pull up the diagnostic screen showing you all the OBD engine codes without using a scanner, and even play with debug options with the car

Started my technician career at a Buick dealer back then. Remember when they first came out brand new, it was quite a surprise to have the touch screen. Replaced a few of the Zenith made touch screens. Instead of people lightly touching the screen, they would smash the screen till it broke. Brought back some great memories. That Reatta is in fantastic shape! The convertible was a night mare fixing water leaks! Lol

One interesting thing is at the time this car came out, GM actually made four two seat cars. Allante, Corvette, Reatta, and Fiero.

Fun fact: Car reviewers criticized the touchscreens on this era Buicks because they thought it would be distracting to the driver. Ironic considering that today people write novel sized texts behind the wheel.

This blows my mind that retro sci-fi touch screen existed in the 80s and worked so well with so little latency. I can almost hear a synthesizer sounding in the background.

I had a poster of this taped to the bottom of the upper level of my bunk bed in my high school years. Above the side view of a candy red reatta in a dark background, the ads reads: go ahead. You deserve it. It’s the first thing I saw every morning 🙂

That screen is giving me some Fallout vibes, and I just love it!

This thing is actually really impressive. Back in the late 80's this must have seemed like a spaceship.

Cars like the Reatta are why I’m subscribed. I don’t care for those high performance exotics. They’re not as interesting

Imagine if GM had the brains to put this tech interior and The GNX engine in a Corvette body... Would have been pure Automotive excellence.

It was a handmade limited production car. It was NEVER intended to be a big seller. It was a halo car. Sort of like a concept car that went into intentionally limited production. The car that actually flopped was the convertible that did away with the ECC which was actually the best thing about the whole car.

My jaw literally dropped a little when you said this thing had a touchscreen lol

"Jan 22 2020" on THAT screen is the most cyberpunk thing you can get

12:23 - The fuel gauge soon actually "zoomed" automatically to the higher precision when your tank had less than 1/4 of a tank along with a low fuel lamp that hovered over it so you didn't mistake 1/4 tank for a full tank. You could easily spend another 20 minutes just going on all the marvelous and thoughtful undocumented smarts of the car when in actual use. It did so many smart things so cleverly. It was really a joy to use. By the way, twilight sentinel also left the interior lights on for a while so you could leave the car in the dark and turned them on in advance so you could see the car when you activated the keyless entry from the key fob. Again, in 1988 this car could do that. And the lights even dimmed slowly on and off like in a movie theater.

Touchscreen from the 80's more responsive than many modern screens in cars.

So GM's vision of the future turned out to be quite accurate.

35 year old Buick touchscreen works better than 2019 Range Rover touchscreen

It is only me that finds this car absolutely mind blowing !!! Especially when you compare to Doug’s other video that shows what soviet Russia was making at the same time.

Doug, you make cornering lights sound special, and recent to this car's vintage. But, GM and Ford had cornering lights for decades before the Reatta. FoMoCo cornering lights on Fords/Lincolns/Mercurys had a delay-off feature, and stayed lit for a few seconds after the turn signal had already switched off. I loved that the early Corvette C4 had cornering-style backup lamps installed on the rear quarter panels which light up when the car is in reverse gear. They work in tandem with the standard backup lamps located at the license plate cubbyhole to give 180-degree illumination.

The fact that the CRT touchscreen wasn’t offered in the Corvette is a crime.

A couple of notes: The reason it says Halogen Lights On is because when this car was made, halogen lights were new. Most cars still had sealed-beam headlamps back then, so Buick was basically flexing. Same story with the "ANTI LOCK BRAKE" wording on the pedal. ABS was new in the late 80s, so again, GM's all like "Yeah, we got all the neat stuff on this. What you got?" As for the "Twilight Sentinel", GM had been calling it that since they first started to put it on cars...back in the 1950s. Yes, you read that right. GM had automatic headlamps in the FIFTIES. Also, I'm frankly astonished to see that all this stuff still WORKS.

Would have been so tempted to go 88 mph in a car like this.

You knock down all these '80s and 90s cars. Remember the reason the horsepower is so low on a lot of American cars back then is because of the fuel crunch from the 70s. Also I remember this car very well, as I was working on a few of them in a garage later years. The 3800 series GM motor may be one of the best motors out there. Easy to work on an very reliable. Back then we love this car especially in red but it was out of our price range. No one had 30 g's for one of these cars, if you did you'd be opting out for a Mercedes BMW or Cadillac.

Listening to Synthwave would be mandatory while driving this car.

My parents bought two to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary. Drove them daily for over twenty years. They both were driven on cross country road trips and once went from Wisconsin to Alaska. Both were very reliable and were driven in excess of 250k. Their German Shepherd rode behind the seats.

I should also say that the apparently "boring" use of GM's 3800 engine was perfectly sound thinking. With all of the new untried electronic devices on the Reatta, using a tried-and-true powertrain meant that even if the newfangled gewgaws started to play funny tricks or fail altogether the car would still _go_ and not leave you stranded. Putting a newly-designed engine and transmission in the Reatta would have meant inevitable replacement part and service headaches, plus the 3800 was a practically unbreakable engine (and if it did go, new and/or used 3800s were very easy to find and comparatively easy to replace). The reason the headlight alert screen reads HALOGEN HEADLIGHTS ON is that most cars into the late 1990s still used incandescent lights. Halogens were quite new, and this was both a piece of "swank" and a reminder that should you need to change a light you needed a halogen bulb, which were not found in many auto stores in the late 1980s and were much more expensive than incandescents; some parts stores would have to special order them.

13:35 - Sorry to be commenting on every little thing but you are bringing back all these great memories. This car as far as I know was one of the first if not THE first with express down and express up windows. You could double-tap down or even double-tap up and the window would go all the way up or down. You might also notice the windows would roll up slightly after the doors close to get a full seal and roll down just a big milliseconds before opening when you opened the door. Those window controls were very ahead of their time. This was in an era when there were still cars rolling out of the showroom with crank-style manual windows.

As a Reatta owner. That horn is failing. The Reatta horn has 3 tones and it sounds like the middle pitch one is out

Thats one of the most responsive touch screens I've ever seen.

I’m probably the only 13-year old watching Doug . I will always love your channel

So this is the car that inspired the Soliad Wendover in BeamNG

“Jan 20 2020”. Doug must have hundreds of these videos just stashed away.

That touchscreen is simply amazing.

The vanity light having 2 positions (bright/dim) was pretty common. Our 1978 Lincoln Mark V had it, too. Dim setting was useful at night so you weren’t blinded by the bright setting.

16:27 - It was lock doors, unlock doors, open trunk, and panic. Interesting design intelligence... Lock instantly locked all doors but unlock at first unlocked only the driver side, tapped a second time opened the passenger side. So unlike the BMW I bought in 1996 that replaced this car, you could actually get in the car and keep your passenger side locked. The panic button honked the horn, flashed the hazards, lit the interior lights, and sounded the factory alarm system. You had to hold panic down for 3 seconds to avoid triggering it accidentally. Again, at this time most alarms were aftermarket. Almost no cars on the road had factory alarm systems and fewer still that could be remotely activated via a wireless keyless fob. When the car locked, it would confirm with two flashes of the hazard lights so you knew it was locked and again with twilight sentinel the lights would stay on for just a bit so your departure was illuminated and then the lights would shut themselves off within about 30 seconds.

Imagine 80's camaro with this car interior.. *Synthwave intensifies*

I live in a retirement town near the beach in Florida. I see mint Buick Reattas and Cadillac Allantes daily.

Imagine if they would’ve given this Buick the Grand National engine from the same era. These things would be highly collectible.

There was one of these for sale near me a few months ago for pretty cheap (only like 1-2k) and I thought about buying it just because of how weird it looked. Now after watching this video I wish I had bought it because this thing is so retro-futuristic that it will probably be a rare cult classic sometime in the future.

Damn, this 80s touchscreen has less lag than some of the cheap new cars I see today

I’ve never seen something like a 1980’s touchscreen.

I once Photoshoped one of these with a similar wheel (Audi Fat Fives, just a bit bigger than the 17s) and a better fitment/stance. Removed that black bit across the car and colour matched the bumpers (car was red). Looked pretty cool.

Buick should bring this and/or the Riviera back. Maybe both? A pair of coupés, one a proper muscle car and the other a small roadster, but make sure they’re both luxurious and well powered.

When I was a kid in the 1980s, a friend of mine's dad had a Reatta. In addition to all the high-tech display and controls, his was fully decked out with all the options, including heated seats and an electric tire pump built into the trunk. The cold weather in the Chicago area played havoc with the electronics though, and by the early 1990s much of the dashboard display had stopped working.

“Cars and bids” should have been named “this and this and this”

I remember when these first were brought to market, A nice body design that could use a some customizing to make it look great.A unique beast.Would be cool to mod the hell out of one of these!

This summer I owned a 91 Buick Reatta convertible. One of the 49 GM executive cars sold. I took it to the big Buick meet in Flint Michigan. The designer of the car was there and he picked my Reatta as his favorite out of 73 there in attendance. He signed my glove box. For a car guy, it was a once in a lifetime experience!

It’s amazing to see that when auto manufacturers want to actually make something really nice and that can last a long time they can! Amazing to see this kind of tech 32 years ago and still works. Good luck having a 2020 bmw touch screen work in 2050

"No Smoking" was actually the owner's hope for all those 80's GM electronics

How insanely cool are those electronics for that time! Really enjoyed this video.

That cabriolet looks fantastic to my eyes!

Wow, love to see that old school green screen with 2020 year on it. At this time is like Blade Runner times.

honestly... it looks like those 80's-90's big white running shoes

I’ve driven a lot of Buicks and the 95 Riviera is probably my favorite. I now have a 90 Reatta that I enjoy. The supercharger is the only thing I would change up to.

This video inspired me to buy a Reatta I was already a 3800 lover, and I found out this car had one! It took me about 2 months to find a good one. I purchased it last May for $950 dollars, talked down from $1200. He even gave me spare electronics (even a CRT screen!). The car needed some light welding on the frame, and a brakeline replaced. But other than that, I am absolutely in love with my Reatta. Its so quirky and retro, it really is a rare gem in GMs lineup. (Interesting thing Doug missed, on the Summary screen the Radio and Climate control are stacked on top of eachother. When you switch the screen to either ‘tab’ the respective section remains in the same place as the summary screen. Just a nice touch GM put in.)

Screw a midsize SUV review...this sort of video is why I follow Doug!

Wow, I had absolutely no idea that touchscreens existed in the 1980s, how cool! And honestly, it seems to be faster than a lot of touchscreens from the 2000s, and even some 2010s cars. Given, it is a lot more simple, but still.

My first car was a used Buick Reatta. I loved this car. For my first car it was pretty good. Every time I see one it brings back fond memories.

Lovely Doug I was looking for this video so long ♥️

You can tell by the intro, Doug enjoys reviewing cars like this the most.

Love these cars and styling! Will look for one soon.

Doug is the type of guy who can make an entertaining, fair, and balanced video of a Reatta or a Veyron. This is why I love it

Always admired the Reatta (or any other car with a minimal grille). It's about 80% Riviera, repackaged. Drove my '87 Rivi with pride for 20 years & miss it. What you didn't mention is that GM was doing clearcoat on these way back then, before most other names, or you wouldn't have been able to show this one. The 165 hp engine was cutting edge back then & fetched 30 to 32 mpg in a max 55 MPH world, 28 mpg in a 70 MPH world & was VERY reliable & long-lived. The rear axle had inflatable shock abs & a compressor that automatically kept the car level. You could fill the trunk with bricks & the headlights would still be in the right place on the road. By holding the OFF & WARM buttons for 5 secs on the Climate screen, you could take it into "service" mode & dump codes with descriptions & overrides without plugging anything into the OBD connector. The seat controllers matched the quirkey window & mirror controllers in 1986 - 1987. There were 4 different lighting technologies on the dash: vacuum fluorescent, electroluminescent, CRT, & light bulbs, all made to render the exact same color & brightness (a hell of a trick). You PUSH the slider to turn on the wipers in 'interval' mode & slide the slider to set the interval. The flocked dashboard & door panel surfaces absorbed some sound & did not reflect sunlight on windows. Regardless of whether these designs were of "the future", it was clear that GM put tons of effort into it resulting in a classy / functional interior that hasn't been seen since.

I was genuinely blown away by that touch screen. So far ahead of it's time that its mind blowing.

I remember one of the car mags, don’t remember which one, did an article on internal GM engine and drivetrain upgrades for the Reatta being tested. They were road-going versions. The most interesting was an AWD version using the turbo 3.8 from the GN. Oh, what could have been!

I used to have a 87 Buick Rivera which was basically the same car. I loved that car. Got many compliments on it. I always kept it super clean. Your video brought back a lot of fond memories. Mine was Rose in color, that’s what GM called it. Much nicer than the white.

This is prime hooptie fleet material. (The new version of it where the cars are all in pristine shape)

This is the most interesting car that I've never heard of.

I have to say I really look forward to watching Doug DeMuro videos. You can take the crappiest car seem so interesting. Cheers to you Doug and many more car videos.

To be fair there are more 2 seater cars today that you could say that are not fun to drive if your saying that mainly on speed performance etc. Being a car fanatic and having owned more cars than I can count in my life, even though I ever owned this car it left quite an impression on me at the time to the point I remember it very well, and if I am totally honest I would say it was very fun to drive even compared to cars 30 years newer, that is what I loved about it!! Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

The touch screen blew my mind, I am one of those persons that press all screens and in some old ATMs and cellphones it takes my a while to figure out why they aren't responding, but this 80s car understands me, where would we be by now if they had used this in the c4 corvette?

Looking at that modern date in that 80’s touchscreen feels like a 80’s scifi movie: ‘Its january 2020 and LA is now a giant prison’

Doug, I have watched this video like five times so far. It's just so fun with how funny this car is.

My first car was a used 1988 Reatta/red. I did not want that thing. lol I remember an old lady giving me a thumbs up one time. My drivers side seat had an extra lumbar support and a weird power knee support that would raise up and down, which was pretty comfortable. There was an extra button next to the fog lights button, you pressed it and the glove box door would pop open. I use to press the button just to surprise who ever was in the passenger seat. It had 3 different low fuel reminders/alerts. The funniest one was the little animation of the gas tank blinking. There was a set of spare keys made of plastic that I never trusted to use. Maybe there were only for making copies. At night if you lift the door handle the dome light would come on and a tiny light in the door lock would light up. Which was actually smart and keeps you from keying your own car. It came with combination ice scrapper/change holder/BOTTLE OPENER. lol

Forgot about the Reatta? Never knew it existed, which is why I love Doug DeMuro

Can't wait for that F50 review you teased in the beginning!

Great video. Filled with retro reminders Reminded me of its cousin the Pontiac Fiero.. loved the unique Buick branding Pulse wipers. Auto lights. Corning lights Many which Buick Cadillac etc had from the 60s 70 and beyond among other luxury details ..thanks again

Doug the type of guy to where someone would ask him how to spell orange and Doug would ask, "the color or the fruit?"

This feels like a return to form for Doug "Quirks and Features" Demuro. The weirder the better!

I imagine the guy buying that car brand new and flexing on everyone with this screen like: "Soon every car will have screen like this". And 30 years later it's finally happening...

The touchscreen and instrument panel are amazing. Not just that they work, but that they seem so well-designed and intuitive. So many cars more recent have made a mess of this. But Buick, with far more limited technology than is available today, got it right first time. Very impressive.

I would actually pay extra to have this touch screen in my current car..... from 2015. So cool and nostalgic.