Its nice to finally see a Sync comment. When the Focus was added to the LT test fleet, I seem to remember the introduction article talking about the only real reason for choosing this car is the Sync system. That being said, there have been sparringly few blogs about it Sync, have there not? It seems like the door handle position is more popular.

I have never used ipods, iphones or bluetooth so they don't matter much to me.......at least not yet. Anyway, I think the idea of software upgrades is a great one! Kudos to Microsoft and Ford.
 
BTW, it's nice to see the SYNC review, Karl!
Question: how does the actual sound system sound? (I'm assuming SYNC comes with a premium sound system.....)
 
PS: How can a sound system be obsolete if it can play CDs, MP3s, WMA, is loud and sounds great? LOL.....

Is SYNC available on any other Ford cars? So far all I hear is Sync & Focus, nothing about the Taurus, Fusion etc.

"PS: How can a sound system be obsolete if it can play CDs, MP3s, WMA, is loud and sounds great? LOL....."
 
Hes not talking about the physical speakers, and wiring. He's talking about the software.

What new software do you need for your radio? As long as the radio has aux in, I'm good to go.
 
What in the software needs an update? MP3s have been standard for a long time. Bluetooth 1.2 is fairly old. Text-to-speech and voice recognition flat out suck in 2008 (plus their usefulness is questionable). GPS? Well if you use an Edge/EVDO/3G model with server-side like Google-maps, why even bother with a data stored in-car?
 
 Radios are pretty cut and dry. Sync is a waste of money, in my eyes and it uses some horrible architecture at its base.

Blueguy, have you tried voice recognition in 2008? On both our long-term Accord and the Focus it works quite well. If you say the word(s) with any amount of clarity it will get them, even if the window is down or you're driving over a crappy (LOUD) road surface (I've tested both).
 
As for what upgrades you need, there's plenty. First, maybe a new, higher-fidelity music compression comes out that's better than MP3. So Microsoft develops a new decoding process and you update your audio system without a single tool or even spending any money. Maybe a new Bluetooth audio system is developed (or the existing one improved) to wirelessly stream music from your personal music player to your head unit. Once again, you get the update without yanking the head unit or spending a dime.
 
You have to have some appreciation for technology for SYNC to matter, but if you do this system (or another one with similar traits) is clearly the next evolution of in-car entertainment/integration and/or functionality.

Karl,
 
Updating the Sync actually requires a level of use-involvement that's troubling. Users must download the update to a USB device, plug that device into Sync, transfer the files to Sync and run the upgrade. Sounds easy? Yeah, until you add the human element to the equation. People don't update their home computers that are connected to the web.
 
Theoretically an automaker could allow Sync to update via EDGE/EVDO (wireless data networks) but this isn't happening yet. Some automakers on their proprietary systems use the cell network for some data transmission (BMW's google project, Honda's traffic flow).
 
Even with the backing of actual servers speech Server 2007 isn't very impressive. Put speech rec on a generic ARM 11 processor in a solid state computer like the Sync and you get very generic commands (Play Artist... Dial Bob Sanders..). Basic cell phones have this level of speech recognition for voice dialing, taking notes, etc. My old Moto E815 had this years ago. Further Honda's voice activated navi system is older than Sync (2002) and performs pretty much the same functions, but also adds in the ability to control car functions like HVAC. Where's that functionality with the Sync? It doesn't exist as Sync is a cookie-cutter app.
 
Additionally, Sync doesn't have integrated GPS abilities! Why not? A GPS receiver costs pennies in bulk. An SDK to perform rudimentary navigation wouldn't require much on MS' part - especially given the fact that MS Maps can be tweaked to work with a laptop/pda sporting a GPS receiver. Really, this is a gross oversight in MS's Auto software.
 
While I like your idea of future-proofing, the reality is there's no need. There's not a new version of MP3 on the horizon. If the tech geeks aren't playing with it right now, then don't expect wide-spread adoption anytime in the next 5 years.
 
Sync uses BT 2.0 EDR. You mention streaming music via BT - Microsoft Auto supports this feature at this moment. It's questionable if this is a good use of your battery life on your cell phone though. Bluetooth 1.2 is common now and it's 5 years old tech. You can still buy cell phones with the even older BT 1.1. Very few cell phones have Bluetooth 2.0 - nobody seems to have BT 2.1.
 
I understand that MS wants to offer a generic catch-all framework for in-car entertainment. Sadly their product seems high on basic user features (voice rec, BT, USB interface) and low on anything that's a tech newer than 2004. Their path to upgrade is clumsy and their argument for upgrading is highly questionable as nothing new is on the horizon. The car's first-owner life cycle will be over before there's any kind of quantum leap in bluetooth or music/movie formats. They may improve speech rec but to what end - the system isn't integrated with the car really?

"Users must download the update to a USB device, plug that device into Sync, transfer the files to Sync and run the upgrade. Sounds easy? Yeah, until you add the human element to the equation. People don't update their home computers that are connected to the web."
 
Compare that to how users update their current, non-SYNC audio systems.
 
"Further Honda's voice activated navi system is older than Sync (2002) and performs pretty much the same functions, but also adds in the ability to control car functions like HVAC. Where's that functionality with the Sync? It doesn't exist as Sync is a cookie-cutter app.
  
Additionally, Sync doesn't have integrated GPS abilities! Why not?"
 
Coming on 2009 SYNC models, including the new Flex. I just saw it in practice last Friday (blog to come soon) and it allows the same features as Honda's system (i.e. voice-entered addresses, "asking" for local food/direction information, etc.).
 
"The car's first-owner life cycle will be over before there's any kind of quantum leap in bluetooth or music/movie formats."
 
That seems a bit presumptuous. Think about how much in-car technology has changed in the last three years. None of us know, for certain, what upgrades are coming in the next three. But I do know this -- existing non-SYNC systems won't benefit from any of them.

Karl,
 
A sync system built into a Ford today will be limited to a few reasonable upgrades:
 
BT - should someone decide BT 2.x is necessary. The reality, very few phones even use 2.0, so the likelihood of going beyond it is not good. You can still buy BT 1.1 phones - these phones are using decade-old technology. 1.2 is also quite old and the most ubiquitous form of BT right now. 2.0 hasn't really trickled down much yet. In two or three years we'll see 2.0 on most phones but 1.1 devices will still be in the public's hands. The life cycle of cell phones is astoundingly long so what's the big shift going to be?
 
Media player - yes through an upgrade they can add or subtract new movie/music codecs. The reality - there's nothing new on the horizon. If a startling new tech showed up today, we're looking at 5+ years before it's mainstream enough to warrant upgrading a car-based player.
 
Speech server isn't likely to see an upgrade because the system is so limited - the first word is usually the key word "route", "dial", "find", etc.
 
GPS? No, the systems today do not have a GPS receiver, so that's not an option. New systems may integrate with GPS but I wonder why MS introduced Sync without GPS to begin with - this is really old technology that still gets a premium (for no reason other than people will pay a premium for it).
 
Wifi? Nope. The antenna would have to be added and someone would have to do that by hand before adding software to support it.
 
Blu-ray? Not without the addition of a new deck.
 
Gaming? No. If the Sync-based cars today don't come wired into rear monitors/speakers/head-phone ports then this is impossible too. With some serious hacking this might be possible. Thankfully at least an industrious person could use BT for the controllers (this would need software too).
  
What's changed in the past 3 years that's so impressive? The addition of a $0.25 aux port is new. This is because it took 7 years since the launch of the iPod and personal MPS players to convince manufacturers there's enough user-base to see value in that quarter add-on.
 
The growing popularity of 20-40 GB HDD to store GPS/Music data is new. How far behind are 20/40 GB HDD? The first highly portable 20 GB ipod showed up in 2002. 5-6 years later we're seeing a trickle of HDD that storage-size. Of course, the actual 20 GB HDD is ancient by computer standards but in a portable format it's relatively young.
 
USB 2.0 is showing up too, but like 20 GB HDD, it's a 7 year old tech.
 
Seeing a pattern? 5+ years for the product to hit before we begin to see it going more mainstream. Bluetooth started in 94 but didn't get much attention at first. In 94 we saw the first MP3 encoder too. It wasn't until 99-2000 that both Bluetooth and MP3 were talked about widely. By 2002-2003 you could find a few cars that could interface with Bluetooth and/or play MP3s. 2004-2005 is when the two became more common in car audio decks.
 
Admittedly, the turn-around was much, much faster than the adoption of the car-based CD player (as late as the early 2000s you could still find cars without CD players).
 
Still the point is, there's a pretty big lull from the moment of creation to public use to wide-spread adoption. It's not until we hit wide-spread adoption that we see these things in cars.
 
Those people with original Sync-based cars have been sold a device under the false pretenses that it will be future-proofed. They can't really add much beyond some basic software and there's nothing in the pipeline that's likely to usurp MP3, WMA, BT, etc. in the near future.
 
What do they gain? Yes they can upgrade. Sadly, there's nothing to upgrade to.

On a slightly off topic note, BDC inadvertently brings up a good point. Auto manufacturers are always pathetically behind the times with current technology. Then when they finally catch up, their upgraded offering are grossly overpriced. Navigation is a prime example. My uneducated opinion says they are losing money on navigation options because of it too. Consumer aren't quite as dumb as they look. If integrated (pretty) navigation costs $2,000, or I can go aftermarket (portable) for less than $500, why spend the extra $1,500? If the navigation systems were reasonably priced, more buyers would opt for them instead of Tomtoms.

Blueguy,
 
Off the top of my head, two things they can upgrade to are DRM and server side apps (via BT to the cell's data network).

7driver,
 
Do you want DRM on the device? That'd be a nightmare.
 
BT to your cell and on to the network still requires EVDO/EDGE/3G and most carriers have crippled BT or would frown upon such tethering without extra moolah.
 
bbechtel, you can put together a data (DVD/HDD)-based GPS system for less than $150 a device (with a touchscreen). I agree with you totally. They are very behind.

Blueguy, as far as ease of upgrading SYNC goes, I think you're talking about what shouldn't be a problem at all. My feeling is that everyone who uses MP3 players and ipods is computer literate and can do basic things like upgrade SYNC on USB. So, yes, upgrading SYNC is that easy.
People like my mother use just the CD or radio......she doesn't even know what MP3 is. (She is computer literate, but she just sees computers as tools for word processing and Internet surfing.....) For her, upgrading SYNC might be more than a chore, but chances are that SYNC would not need upgrades if all the user wants is to play CDs and listen to radio.
 
I share your concerns about DRM. Could be a big problem.
 
If anyone wants GPS with SYNC, why not buy navigation or a Garmin? As far as I'm concerned, GPS capabilities are not necessary with SYNC.

The fender vents on the Focus make it a compelling choice. So modern, so stylish, such WoW factor.

blueguy,
 
*I* don't want DRM on the device. However, never overestimate the intelligence of the RIAA.

Blueguy, as far as ease of upgrading SYNC goes, I think you're talking about what shouldn't be a problem at all. My feeling is that everyone who uses MP3 players and ipods is computer literate and can do basic things like upgrade SYNC on USB. So, yes, upgrading SYNC is that easy.
 
You give the average user far too much credit. People claim - journalists even - they can't figure out iDrive and that doesn''t involve downloading, moving the file, re-uploading and installing software. Give those same people the ability to upload software onto their car's headunit and you will get problems. Especially MS software.
 
If anyone wants GPS with SYNC, why not buy navigation or a Garmin? As far as I'm concerned, GPS capabilities are not necessary with SYNC.
 
I kinda agree, except for one small thing - Sync was introduced last year during the giant surge in Navi. MS Maps and Streets programs already can perform navigation tasks; they have full routing with a GPS puck. MS touts text-to-speech for MS Auto (Sync) on the official website. What goes better with text-to-speech than GPS directions? And MS already makes programs for TTS. And they go on about speech recognition. Can we say vertically integrated?
 
I won't get into the cost of LCDs, GPS, software, etc. I'll save it for this simple thing: MS Auto should come with basic support for MS Maps data.
 
That support would allow allow manufacturers and even aftermarket people to finally offer basic headunits that perform rudimentary navigation (where am I now, directions to specific locations) with Text-to-Speech directions. According to Karl, the next gen does solve this issue (of course, Sync 1.0 owners are screwed).
 
I've yet to hear anything about future updates though? Bug fixes, for sure, but will we see any updates for Sync 1.0 when 2.0 shows up and offers a bit more of the tasty buyers crave?
 
I really do like the idea of Sync. i just think it was rushed to market and it's being sold with false promises.

I carry a good 'ol fashioned map in my car of Tampa. I haven't yet seen a street that's got up on it's hind legs and moved. I also have a map for the state so i can see the major roads.
 
If I need anything further than that, GoogleEarth/MapQuest seems accurate enough for me. I don't even have to pay for them to be updated.
 
Sure looking at a piece of paper isn't as sexy as playing with a gadget in your car, but it's just as good and costs almost nothing on my part.

altimadude,
 
One problem your paper can't solve: When you're driving through a dodgy unfamiliar part of town when a toddler voice wafts from the back saying "I need to go potty and I can't wait".

Um, if someone was computer illiterate and couldn't figure out how to do the Sync upgrade, wouldn't they just have their dealer do it? I think even morons could handle that.
 
To answer a previous question: I think the Fusion, Edge, Taurus, and their Lincoln/Mercury clones all have Sync too. With the Lincolns it's standard.
 
I'll be interested to see what Hyundai comes up with - Microsoft Auto gives you the OS, connectivity, and voice-recognition but you have to program what functionality you want. Be interesting to see how much advantage Ford's "head start" gives them...

Couldn't you use a bluetooth GPS receiver and a software update to the current Sync to get navigation pretty easily. This is a combined software / hardware approach, but the BT connectivity makes the hardware part pretty painless, and also allows for better placement of the receiver to 'see' the satellites anyway (better than the integrated $300 - $500 portables, usually, due to the small size needed for a receiver without a display).

7driver -- If i find myself in that situation:
 
1) I'm a bad driver since I'd try to avoid those parts of town.
2) I'm a bad parent for not planning ahead for those kinds of emergencies.
3) Windows are made to look out of: Golden Arches and gas station signs are hard to miss.
 
By the time I have a chance to go through the multiple screens to the point of interest screen on my navigation display (which I would have to stop the car to play with in that dodgy unfamiliar part of town) I could be miles down the road looking for a place to take care of the problem.

I think one of the first questions in this discussion is a key one... does the sound system behind Synch actually sound good? I've still to hear anything about this.
 
Personally, I'm of the "who cares" perspective on Synch. It just seems like the answer to a question nobody was asking for (like iDrive). My Mazda5 has built in bluetooth or my phone and it works well. I have an Aux in jack for my iPod which I think I've used a few times.
 
The last thing I want in my car is anything from Microsoft. I can't even stand using their substandard products on the laptop my work provides me. If Vista is any indication, the Synch system will be crashing on a regular basis.
 
As for GPS, I'm a fan of the technology but cannot fathom why auto journalists keep harping on this being built into the cars... perhaps it's simply because they never actually have to pay for the cars they drive. In a few years we'll look back at cars with built in nav like we cars from the 1980s with hard-wired analog cell phones.
 
I have a portable Magellan unit that costs less than $200 from Costco and can travel with me when I visit other parts of the country. Why would I want to pay $2k to have this hard-wired into my car that's parked at the airport back at home? Check out the value that KBB adds to used models with and without Nav... you get about $200 added for Nav of the $2k this option usually costs.
 
To make matters worse, most of the systems get overly complicated by routing basic functions like climate controls and the radio through the nav screen. This means that a simple command can take a stroll through multiple menus when a single button on the dash used to do the trick. Heaven help us when these cars are 15 years old and the nav screen is dead... you won't even be able to turn on your radio.
 
Give me a good car that's interesting to look at and to drive first... the fancy stereo won't get me to buy the car. Integrated BT for my phone is the only part I really think has any impact on the driving experience. If you must talk on the phone while driving it makes it much safer and would like to see this on every car I have in the future.