Technology has come a long way over the last ten years. Pretty much all of us carry around a cell phone with more capability than a computer from 2005, the same year YouTube went live and one year after Zuckerberg launched Facebook. Our cars have also adapted to these changes as well, and this year will mark the first (and certainly not last) time I can say that I personally updated the software in my car.
I noticed in the comments section of my post on the 2015 New York International Auto Show that some of you are completely against having some of this new tech in your cars. I can certainly understand your reservations, even if I disagree and enjoy having multiple entertainment options at my fingertips or on the tip of my tongue, in the form of voice commands.
For me, the benefits outweigh the costs. While having phone calls integrated into the car does have an annoyance factor and insures that you truly cannot disconnect from the outside world while driving, it does provide a measure of convenience, and prevents me from breaking the law.
This helped me immensely the other day when I had to pick up a friend from the airport who insisted on texting me instead of calling my phone while I was on the way to get him. If not for this update, I would not have had the ability to hear his messages over the speakers and respond to them with pre-recorded responses. Fortunately everything worked out, despite me sending the wrong texts back to him (I sent “LOL” when he asked me how far away I was from the terminal), but since the texts themselves are sent with a “sent from my Ford” signature he figured out what was going on. Once I picked him up, I had him text me George Carlin’s “Seven Things You Can’t Say on TV” to see if the car would read it back. To much hilarity, it did, or rather “she” did, because SYNC’s voice is a very Siri-esque female. So fellow SYNC owners should note that the system does not mince words in any capacity, with great results. It was a nice to have a whole new section of phone capabilities opened up to me that I previously couldn’t access.
Now a lot of the chatter about electronic devices and car integration have focused on the phone, but to me the most important feature I use in my Focus relates to music. That is why you see a 4th gen Ipod Touch 64gb residing in my center console. Its my go to source for music entertainment and allows me to download and listen to podcasts as well, with no consequence to battery life since its plugged in to the USB port. The biggest advantage the Ford system has over competitors is that the system can accept voice commands that allow you to select an individual artist, song, album, or playlist, which goes beyond the capabilities from manufacturers like Volkswagen, which can only do basic commands like “play,” “next track,” or “shuffle.”
So if you’re an audiophile that likes having just as much control over your music with voice commands as you would physically scrolling through the player itself, I would highly suggest you check out the SYNC system if you’re in the market for a new car. If I get a change of heart and want to switch from playing The Beatles to The Kinks, I can simply say “USB” then “play artist The Kinks” or “play album Village Green Preservation Society” if I so desire. It works quickly and the commands are interpreted correctly as long as you don’t mumble. If you’re driving, being able to switch music without looking at the player itself is an absolute godsend.
Back to the update. Aside from updating the software to work with newer phones in regards to text messaging capabilities, it also tweaked the software to work better with Ipods (and presumably Iphones that can essentially function as Ipods if desired). Voice commands seem to work faster and are more accurate now. And I swear the playback quality has improved for better sound. Another interesting aspect of this update was the change to how your song and artist are displayed on the screen itself. If you look at the above picture, you can see that the song and artist are simply shown, along with time elapsed. Previously you would see SO for song and AR for artist, so in the picture above the information would read SO: Junior’s Farm and AR: Paul McCartney. This new change makes for a much cleaner display and is most welcome.
Now I would be remiss if I didn’t tell you how updating the software works. Basically, you need to create an account on the Ford Owner website, and also have a USB flash drive with at least 2gb of storage free. I used the same exact model as the one pictured above and everything worked out fine. User Asreal made a fantastic post regarding the installation on mustangsource.com which I’ll link to here. There are many steps to installing the software in your car that are followed on that link, but afterwards you should be able to successfully install SYNC 4.4.
I just realized I never explained my feelings before doing the update. If I told you I was calm, I’d be lying. With the flash drive inserted into the USB port, I started the installation process and waited in the drivers seat, basically staring at the screen you see above for about twenty minutes while the system did its thing on the other LCD display, which at one time went black in order to reboot. Not exactly confidence inspiring, but my patience paid off and everything went well. There was no catastrophic system failure like I was picturing in my head, and all I had to do was idle my car for a little bit longer than I normally would, since the update requires your car to be running. That is why you see the 24.8 average for that tank of gas – turns out that installing and playing around with the tech goodies of your car uses a bit of gas!
On top of everything else, SYNC Applink, Ford’s fancy name for letting developers integrate their projects into the system, works better than ever before. So good, in fact, that I may partially abandon my Ipod and start using my phone to put Spotify on (in?) my stereo. At the time of this writing I just got back from running an errand and decided to use Spotify the entire time I was in the car. Success! The car and phone were friendly with each other, and I was able to listen to a playlist I created on my computer just before getting behind the wheel. It seems looks like Spotify Premium gives you much more freedom than that, but for now I’m happy with the free version. All in all, it was, and continues to be, a good experience. I’m happy Ford lets third party developers work with them, otherwise it could have been very possible to own a car that felt technologically out of date.
I’ve no doubt intrigued some of you, and sent the others to craigslist in order to buy a bona fide CC that contains nothing like SYNC. To each their own, as they say. Anyway, if you’re a Ford owner and have any questions about the update process, leave a comment and I’ll try to help you. Otherwise, I’ll be enjoying all this technology until the day Skynet inevitably rises up and enslaves us all.
All well and good but did Ford finally fix the Power-Shift “automatic” ? Lots of software updates there and still tons of complaints.
Get the basics right first, Ford.
The problem with Power-Shift is that is doesn’t feel like Powerglide. So lots of people are determined to believe that its broke. Sometimes I wonder how many complaints could be headed off by the user willingly advancing into the 21st century.
I haven’t experienced the Ford dual clutch transmission, but I am familiar with the VW wet plate version in my wife’s Beetle – it’s different feeling when starting to move for sure, but no grinding, bangs, clunks, or other worrisome sounds. It seems to suit my wife’s punch it and go driving style and she has not complained about it. Shifts are practically instant and very smooth once you get rolling and it works well with the TDI engine. The online advice for smooth take offs is to wait a nanosecond after releasing the brake before applying the throttle to allow it to reach slightly further into the clutch bite point before accelerating. I don’t know if this would help the Ford unit or not.
My personal experience with the Powershift has been mostly fine. I find that the DCT is cranky under 20 MPH or so and shudders a bit when switching my foot from the brake to the gas pedal. It also sometimes makes a grinding noise from second to third, but these are relatively minor quibbles.
I have driven a fair number of 2014 and 2015 Foci and they exhibit none of the aforementioned issues, so I’m pretty confident in saying that Ford has essentially eliminated the problem.
Hopefully they have–lots of complaints about the DCT’s erratic operation crossed the Focus off my list when I was car shopping in late ’11. But the 2012 model was, I think, the first one so equipped, so naturally there would have been bugs. Some of the same issues were observed with Hyundai’s variant in the ’12 Veloster, so that one got axed from my consideration also.
Something like SYNC would be nice to have though. I find myself stealing glances at my phone screen more often than I should, though I refrain from texting and try not to place calls.
I have a 2012 and I am on my third clutch.
Wow, thats 3 clutches too much. Has your experience at the dealership at least been okay, and do you still like the car?
FWIU a year or so into the current generation Ford formally announced that the manual transmission take rate on the (non-ST) Focus has been higher than expected. I’ll go for that kind of Luddism.
I would be really nervous about that update too.. More than one of my electronic items has been destroyed in that manner, especially my Nexus 7 tablet… Just at the same time they introduced a new Nexus.. Hmmmm.
Siri Hands Free works pretty good*, and is supported by my ’15 Honda Fit. The Fit is also supposed to be CarPlay compatible, but Honda is still dragging its feet about implementing – I presume that will be a dealer software flash once (if) they do get it going.
*Siri does have problems with oddly spelled names, such as the “Quebe Sisters Band” (pronounced ‘kwaybee’).
I’m not keen on voice activation for the latter reason. My phone has a voice dialing system that I quickly discovered was really incapable of dealing with names that were not what I suppose you could call Anglo-Saxon. At one point, I sat there trying to figure out how I would need to mispronounce a particular name to get the phone to recognize what I was talking about, but no dice.
I sat there trying to figure out how I would need to mispronounce a particular name to get the phone to recognize what I was talking about, but no dice.
My Garmin has the same problem going the other way.
In Ohio, there are “County Highways”, abbreviated “CH”, which the Garmin pronounces “church”
Road, abbreviated “Rd” is pronounced “round”
I was in unfamiliar territory last Saturday, and it came up with a spectacular mispronunciation of a road name. I had to look at the display to see what the thing was trying to say.
My 14 year old Focus still interfaces with current devices just as well as it did in 2001.
I wonder, in 2027 will the updates still be coming to connect with current devices, or will luddites who drive old cars be forced to hoard old ipods and phones to stay connected?
Why wait until then? I took over my dad’s 10+ year old Garmin StreetPilot C330 a couple years ago and use it as my primary GPS. It takes a while to find the satellites sometimes, but otherwise the maps are just as outdated as the more current models.
One thing I miss about it is that it doesn’t speak road names like the newer ones, mispronunciations of which are a frequent source of amusement to me, at least if I mostly know where I’m going. My favorite such issue is when going with my wife to her sister’s house. En route, the Garmin’s pronunciation of the name of the same road changes for some reason.
Sync isn’t very intuitive, I think. I enjoy just plugging into the USB, having my music come up and away I go.
“The biggest advantage the Ford system has over competitors is that the system can accept voice commands that allow you to select an individual artist, song, album, or playlist, which goes beyond the capabilities from manufacturers like Volkswagen, which can only do basic commands like “play,” “next track,” or “shuffle.” ”
Yes it is an advantage when the system actually works. I am not sure if the SYNC system in your 2013 is a better system then I had in my 2012 Fiesta but Sync in my Fiesta gave me nothing but high blood pressure as I found myself yelling at the damn thing all the time because it would play a different song or artist then I asked for (for example I would ask it to play Artist Rod Stewart and it would play Toto or Journey )
Ford updated the software and then replaced the module and it still misbehaved.
In the end I traded it in and my blood pressure went back to normal.
I love new technology but I hated Sync and Ford for making it so that I needed the Sync package in order to use my flash drive or iPod.
All I want is to get into my car and plug in a flash drive or iPod and away goes my music.
I’d rate Sync’s accuracy for interpreting my Midwest-accented voice commands as 50% at best in my 2012 Escape; I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s gotten a lot better with subsequent upgrades, but it was pretty hit-and-miss back then.
However, Sync was far superior to the Honda system in what replaced the Escape, a 2013 Acura ILX. That was simply pitiful, and required navigating through several menus at a time to perform basic functions to boot. (“iPod Search… Find Artist U2… Play U2… PLAY U2!!”)
Conversely, my Jetta handles voice prompts – what few there are – damn near perfectly, every time. I’m sure that will be of little consolation when the turbo blows at 10K, but I’m enjoying it now. 🙂
Consumer Reports says Ford’s MyTouch is why most of their models earn below-average (at best) reliability statistics. But I would avoid •any• car with this stuff until industry gets its act together in reliability, ease-of-use, user privacy, & malware security. Otherwise I’d rather just play the Luddite & avoid the worry which I already have about desktop computers & other smart devices. Call me a heretic, but not everything in life must be computerized, & I’m sick of bloatware which adds little value to everyday life & slows down insanely fast multicore CPUs.
Now Tesla supposedly does better here, but it’s a Don’t-Care since it’s not in my price league anyway.
Hey Neil, from a fellow Luddite and heretic, I’m on the same page as you. Don’t want any of this junk in my car, there’s enough distractions while driving these days as it is. Don’t care if you have a hands-free phone, you are still distracted.
Perhaps I understated how bad things are; while I’m still a trifle skeptical, there have been stories of cars being digitally hijacked (at least by experimenters). I dearly hope these are only Urban Legends from journalists with “60 Minutes” ethics.
Never underestimate programmer stupidity; unlike automotive engineering, any degreed fool can get a software job, and coupled with careless management & poor QC, easily explains the Target & Home Depot scandals.
Example: The 2004 4-cyl Camry scandal was attributed to a failure to conform to Toyota’s corporate coding standards.
I’m less concerned with digital hijacking (which at this point probably couldn’t amount to anything other than an annoyance) and more with privacy, which is a real concern with these systems. I’m really not keen on having automakers join the ranks of corporations trying to track everything I do.
Infotainment in general is the number 1 new car complaint
Another Luddite here. The fewer distractions I have operating in my car, the better. I don’t carry a phone, and most of the time, my 10-year-old Mazda’s sound system is turned off. I enjoy silence.
I wish I could just forget the factory systems and go aftermarket. But unfortunately it’s getting impossible to avoid in a moderately-optioned new car.
For under $1000 you can have a really nice aftermarket system that does anything media-related you could ever want. And unlike proprietary factory systems, you can replace it in five years with better technology. And you’ll probably want to, because this is essentially disposable technology. I did this in my F-150. I actually spent under $300 and an afternoon of my time and ended up with a video player for the kids, a backup camera, bluetooth phone connectivity including Pandora, and integration to Google Now voice commands on my phone. And the best part is my entire personal music and kid’s video library resides on a USB stick inside my glovebox and is always connected.
I love technology in cars, I just hate the proprietary systems that are in use now because they get outdated so quickly. Just wait until they need repair out of warranty. I have a feeling millions of cars will end up junked with plenty of mechanical life left in them.
+1
Definitely true. My ’97 Crown Vic now has easier to use Bluetooth integration than my 2012 Forte Koup, thanks to a $100 or so aftermarket Sony head unit. The unit in the Forte is completely integrated into the dash and cannot be replaced. So things have gone backwards in that regard; of course the manufacturers don’t see it that way, they love that the only way to upgrade is to buy a whole new car.
This fits right in with the current push to view engine-management and infotainment software as governed by the DMCA, which would lead us down the road to cars where any modification whatsoever is a copyright violation.
I remember when Ford did the same thing with their ovoid radio clusters back in the 90’s. Bad idea then, bad idea now.
What needs to happen is they need to decouple HVAC and other vehicle controls from the touchscreen or standardize the communication, like they do with OBDII. They then need to standardize the size and design of the touchscreen so it can be replaced just like you would a stereo.
Unfortunately, the chances of that happening don’t appear to be very good. About the only way it could happen would be through regulatory pressure. That is unlikely considering the EPA likes taking older less efficient cars off the road.
+1
I am extremely fascinated with this degree of technology, but having a mere AUX input for a Sony Walkman in my F-150 does me just fine.
What has always had me curious is the anticipated lifespan for the electronics in cars, such as the SYNC system.
It still surprises me that automakers finally caved in & supplied those marvelously flexible AUX jacks, for Sony Walkmans etc. could’ve displaced dash cassette players decades ago & cost dealers & the aftermarket a lot of money.
My automobile only interfaces with this. Interesting read though !
Our Diesel pump handles are often green, like the one in the background. One place also sells 110 octane racing fuel (at European prices). No surprise; a drag strip is a couple miles down the road.
Amazing: Yesterday I saw a local station finally selling Diesel at parity with Regular. If only it would stay that way instead of riding the commodity-price roller-coaster.
Most oil companies / gas stations offer 2 sorts of diesel and 2 sorts of gasoline, like below. Big trucks mostly have their own high-capacity (more liters per minute) pump at the stations.
Thanks; usually I only see #2 Diesel on tap, perhaps because of our climate here. I haven’t encountered high-capacity truck ⛽, maybe they’re only at truck stops.
I guessed that was Shell because of colors & corporate “design language.” I prefer Costco & Shell since they’re cheap but among the TopTierGas.com brands.
These days the oil companies offer “regular” gas / diesel and the (more expensive) “premium” gas /diesel, V-power in the case of Shell. Hence 4 sorts of fuel.
I just fill it up with the regular diesel, fine with me. My classic gets BP Ultimate 98 gasoline. Because of its higher octane rating and, more important, because it’s ethanol-free (Ultimate is BP’s name for premium fuels).
…I realize this has nothing to do with Edward’s software-updates. But it’s still car-related…
And I bet yours can play Windows phones too, sigh. I wish dad’s Chevrolet did that, only plays iPods.
I’m ok with all this tech, just not looking forward to fixing it years down the road. Older setups could be removed and replaced with an aftermarket setup, if the original broke. Now… not so much. Fixing our refurbishing would be your only option, and a costly one at that.
“Format Rot” is the slang term concerning programs or files which cannot be used anymore because of obsolescence. It’s a serious problem in the defense biz, which has very long system lifetimes.
Good info. Now I’m curious as to what the capabilities of SYNC are in a 2009 Mariner, and if it’s upgradable to something like the current system. I know it will Bluetooth a phone and sync an iPod, but beyond that I don’t know.
From what I can gather, this update only applies to SYNC equipped cars from 2010-2014, so there must have been some sort of hardware change between ’09 and ’10.
Definitely in the Luddite camp since my cars are a ’75 and a ’77 model, so the only software upgrades are new HEI modules. As long as an iPod (which is itself obsolete now) can be hooked up for music, I’m fine with the cardboard speakers–like the sound, actually, and the sliding climate control levers.
Of all the technology available, however, the one I really don’t want is to have my smart phone synched up to the car. Recently took my ’75 on a roadtrip around the south. Enjoyed greatly being unplugged from the office, especially in areas where T-Mobile got bad reception because it is the perfect excuse for ignoring everything. I get a great deal of pleasure out of having people try in vain to reach me on matters that are not important but, because they normally have the ability to reach me, assume an undue importance, particularly in the mind of the sender.
My mom periodically gets software upgrades on her Prius however. So it’s not totally unfamiliar territory.
Lots of Man Cards need to be surrendered in this thread….Obsessing about some stupid distraction in the dash, there to keep the kids and womyn occupied….things are really going downhill. AM radio with reception, I’m happy. Too many close calls from some female messing with her phone or the dash distraction while on my bike. And yes, it’s mainly womyn; I was close enough to tell.
Oh, and never update. Just don’t do it. Buy something new, but just never update. They had to put the restore point into computers just to take care of all the problems updating causes.
Lest you think I surrendered my Man Card, I just drove my 52 year old Ford for just over 1,000 miles. No air, no power steering, no power brakes, no automatic transmission, and no radio. It was a blast.
LOL, sorry man, you just lost your Man Card and with it the authority to revoke others when you used the term “womyn”.
I’ll stay away from the debate about whether this is more of a female- or male-centered phenomenon (I think it’s a youth marketing thing, really), but it’s telling that many a car ad these days spends an exorbitant amount of time describing the technology available in a car and not one second on the actual driving experience. Ford may be the worst offender here–especially when it comes to the smaller end of its lineup. But who can blame them? Just getting young people to drive is apparently a tough sell these days.
The navigation in our 2011 MINI has never received a map update, because the update process is more tedious than just letting Google Maps or Waze, which get real-time updates, just tell me where to go through my bluetooth headset (which also reads me texts and lets me answer by dictating replies). What I want is not a car manufacturer’s proprietary interface that I need to learn, what I want is my Android (or iOS) experience in front of me, simplified for driving needs, with voice commands.
Hear, hear! Why pay for a car company’s expensive, buggy gadgetry when you already have consumer electronics able to do the same thing for much less money? Even if these too turn out to be buggy, at least you don’t have to visit the dealer & hope headquarters actually cares about the problem.
Best the car companies can do, besides engine controls, is sensor-based safety aids. If these keep a smartphone zombie from rear-ending me, then they’re a good thing.
Those Ford ads drive me fucking nuts, they’re selling cars like Tide does with laundry detergent – “lets here what Joe and Jane average have to say!”. Between that and calling something so fundamentally awesome as a twin turbocharged engine a name that couldn’t be more lame and wussy sounding as “Ecoboost” they don’t do a good job attracting this millennial. I don’t give a crap about Myfordsynctainment or whatever they’re calling it. Why listen to radio when I have an awesome sounding exhaust, also a good excuse not to talk on the phone.
The original name was the much less wussy sounding “TwinForce” but the recession and high gas prices put the end to that.
Ford has long had difficulty coining cool-sounding engine names. Back in the ’90s, their staff envied “Northstar” as opposed to their own lame “Duratec”.
I never though engines needed names anyway, but US carmakers have long been in thrall to marketing & all its psychological humbug.
The Northstar equivalent would have been Lincoln’s InTech, the 4.6l DOHC V8. Not that that name is any better(sounds like the company’s name in Office Space), and GM had EcoTech, so they’re not one to talk.
Plus I’d argue the current 5.0 “Coyote” is a cool name, and the classic Windsor and Cleveland were just cool names to say after the displacement, even if they weren’t technically official. Saying Three-Fifty-One-Cleveland is just fun.
Sure, but advertising and names aside, Ford is currently putting out some of the most engaging cars on the market. Fusion, Focus, Escape, all at or near the top of their class in driving dynamics and almost every review shows it. They need the fluff ads to sell their much-maligned infotainment systems.
That’s the irony; now that Fords have good roadholding (thanks to Richard Perry-Jones), they then tout the infotainment as if the chassis doesn’t matter & they were building LTDs again. But to me, driving ●is● the entertainment.
That’s my gripe Neil, Ford’s current lineup is probably the best the all around the company has ever had dynamically, yet pretty much all you here about in their commercials is the infotainment related crap. There’s the Ecoboost challange ads too, but it seems like all they show in those ads is the potential customers parking lol. The biggest weakness Ford has is their marketing, it sucks. It may draw in the I hate cars crowd but the people who actually desire the real qualities the cars have is all word of mouth(or touchscreen these days), nobody desiring the performance of EcoBoost is being sold by the ads with random people exclaiming “WOW! This button works better than it did in my Santa Fe, I can’t believe this is a Ford!”
yet pretty much all you here about in their commercials is the infotainment related crap. There’s the Ecoboost challange ads too, but it seems like all they show in those ads is the potential customers parking lol.
I’m sure they are designing the ads for their target market. They decided what demographic they wanted to aim at (it isn’t car guys), looked around and saw that demographic was constantly fiddling with their cell phones.
Did you notice that the buttons in the center stack of the 2012 Focus and Fiesta even look like a cell phone keypad of a few years ago, when those models were being designed, with their slanting rows of identical buttons? Doesn’t matter that the design makes it hard to operate anything without taking your eyes off the road to see if you are pushing the right button, it looks familiar to the cell phone obsessed demographic. Now the industry is following the cell phone move to touch screens, so things are even harder to operate without taking your eyes off the road.
Well that’s my point. Pretty much every review praises Ford’s dynamic virtues. Ford doesn’t need to do much advertising on that because it’s become well known. Sync, on the other hand, has been widely panned so they need to try to try to make it look good.
…car ad these days spends an exorbitant amount of time describing the technology available in a car and not one second on the actual driving experience.
Yup. Like the current GM ad with a bunch of people sitting at a table with half a dozen car logos and they are told “who was the first to have 4GLTE WiFi in their cars?”…and I say “but will it get me where I want to go?”
This is the last FoMoCo ad I can remember, that actually was about the vehicle, and promoted a high performance image. We don’t see ads like this anymore, from anyone. Now it’s all about how your car can be like your cell phone.
You stay classy, Ken.
I always make the crack that all of our cars have the top line infotainment systems but I listen to AM all sports talk most of the time
Good post…learned a few things about Sync I didn’t know. Thank you! I don’t have much experience with older Sync systems, but Ford seem to have worked out many of the earlier bugs. I just purchased a 2015 F150 and have found its iteration of Sync to be excellent and straightforward to use. I agree that the Sync voice command function is the best of any other voice command system I’ve interacted with…way better than my wife’s 2012 MDX (which is nearly useless) and better than my dad’s 2013 Grand Cherokee (which is pretty good). And it was the easiest, quickest iPhone pairing I’ve yet done. Impressed so far. Given how important our mobile devices are to daily life for most of us, for better or worse, I consider solid, straightforward mobile device integration one of the “basics” that car companies need to get right out of the gate.
I had a new 2012 Focus SE company car and liked Sync and the ability to take phone calls hands free. I’m not into the iPod music thing, probably because at my age I’m fine with the stereo including satellite or plugging in a CD. My wife is very much into using her iPod because of our daughters so I leave that stuff to her. She can plug into the USB and play away.
The transmission programming issue wasn’t a big deal for the time I had the Focus. Yes, an annoyance depending on the type of road I was driving. Overall, I was very impressed with my 2012 SE and the 2008 SE that preceded it. Both cars took a licking every two weeks on a very steep and rough road that went up a mountain to a coal mine.
Wow, so it’ll read text messages? That seems like a great way to prank your buddies while they’re driving their new Fords with grandma/grandpa/boss/first date sitting in the passenger seat. “REMINDER: ASSHOLE BLEACHING APPOINTMENT TODAY AT THREE PEE EM.” “REMINDER: LIBRARY BOOK, MINE COMPF, IS OVER DUE” “REDIALING… TIGHT SLIZ UNLIMITED ESCORT SERVICE EL EL SEE”
I rented a Focus a few years ago and really liked it. The SYNC or MyFordInvisibleTouch or whatever the proper name is worked just fine, I found it very simple and straightforward to use. Personally, I will never use the voice activated function of anything, however. It just feels too silly. Spotify is definitely a winner, though – and if you don’t know, you can add whatever digital audio files you’ve already got right into it and they’ll play along with the streamed content (I think you can even import stuff straight from iTunes).
I did think the transmission was a little funky, but it could’ve just been one of those things you have to get used to. I haven’t driven many dual clutch-equipped cars in general, and since it was a rental who knows. When I do finally end up needing to buy a new-ish car, this may be what I end up with – although not with the DCT, or even the manual transmission. I’d really like to own a plug-in hybrid or EV at some point, and the relatively obscure Focus Electric seems like a huge bargain used. The range and performance are fairly ho-hum but I like the looks, the size and the 5-door format better than most of its competitors. I also like that it’s totally stealth as far as being an EV, with only a different grille and some badges marking it. But who knows… I’m not married to that idea, and my shit-turd beater Buick hasn’t yet forced my hand.
People today are obsessed with staying connected and the latest technology. To many it’s more important that life it’self. I use technology in my cars in the form of a mobile Garmin that can be switched from car to car, even my 1981 TA. I use Satellite radio on my 2013 Impala. I have a cell phone. 90% of the cell phone calls or texts I receive are irrelevant trivial nonsense or drama so it gives me a certain amount of pleasure when I can ignore these calls by simply turning the phone off and saying the battery died or I left it in another car etc. This way calls can be filtered and something that is actually important can be answered. The technology in current car’s is getting to the point were I don’t really want a new car. The new 2015 Impala and Kia Cadenza are two examples that have eliminated the key hole so you can’t manually unlock the driver’s door if your battery fails. So you are relying on the remote just to get into your car and we know how those can fail without warning. Or how about cars with power opening doors. So what happens when your car battery craps out? I have heard that std equipment battery’s in cars today are designed to only last 3-4 years instead of 7-8 years ago unless you spend several hundred on a replacement. Tow trucks are going to me in high demand in the future.
How about built in navigation screens or older Onstar systems? What happens when the software is outdated and can’t be upgraded? How about all the numerous and different touch screens? When those fail you are going to be forced to either hopefully find a working unit on Ebay or pray the manufacturer still makes a replacement.
And I love the apps that can unlock or start your car with it’s push button starting system which can be hacked by a kid. Goodbye car. So who is liable for a car stolen by a kid hacking it?
Technology is and can be a great thing. But I have to draw the line when my privacy is invaded, a kid can break in, start and steal my car, I can’t upgrade it in a few years time due to obsolescence and things that should be simple and easy require me to take my eyes off the road to scroll through menus just to change the volume on the radio etc.
Actually the Impala does have a door lock cylinder. The right side of the driver’s door handle has a pop-off cover to expose it. Obviously, it’s only meant to be used if the battery goes dead. Covering actually isn’t that bad of an idea either, considering it’s rarely if ever used. Could be more obvious though.
http://www.locksmithledger.com/article/11445882/servicing-the-2014-chevrolet-impala-part-2
People are so obsessed, they leave their engines idling for minutes at a time while parked (30 is my record observation). Evidently, staying connected is so important, even gas must be sacrificed. And of course there are distracted pedestrians (“smartphone zombies”). This is serious Priority Inversion, if you’ll pardon my software jargon.
It took me a full year before I figured out all the steering wheel controls of my 2012 Ford Escape!!
Getting my iPhone to sync up took over a dozen attempts at the dealership. Then the voice command feature “call Jane” would respond ” unable to locate Jane”. Approximately two years later, I bought the car in for a “Customer Satisfaction” program related to the throttle body (a whole new issue itself). Appears Sync also received a flash update because it now works (Hooray!!).
I appreciate the features of Sync, but please get the system right upon delivery at the dealership
I’m happy just having a CD player in my 2005 Focus, but +1 to the author for mentioning the Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society