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Comment by jessriedel | Hacker News Reader

> "the Ford executives believe that the firm’s in-house tech expertise is under-appreciated"

5 minutes trying to use a Ford's music system makes it pretty clear that, at least for tech UI, they are awful. That they aren't publicly sheepish about it suggests that the guys in charge don't even notice the differences.

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... but isn't Sync a Microsoft product built into Ford cars? It certainly was when I worked there in the mid-2000s.

EDIT: Gen 1 and 2 are while the upcoming Gen 3 is built by Blackberry.

"Ford cited issues with Microsoft's complex software dragging down its scores with Consumer Reports and other consumer magazines being a reason it switched to BlackBerry."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Sync

I tried out Sync myself, and I strongly agree with jessriedel. What's more, I don't think the bad design can be blamed on MS; much of Ford's side of it was a failure too. From my review at the time [1]

- They don't make it easy to get someone to show you the system. (pts 1 and 2)

- They make it so that if you just leave your iPod (a lot of people didn't have the phone at the time) plugged in, it has to be prominently visible to thieves (pt 4)

- Despite them expecting you to use Sync for anything and everything, it's on an inner row of the steering wheel, requiring a really long thumb stretch to reach. (pt 6)

- Hitting the phone button when you don't have a phone set up with it, will disable the audio system (and thus, further Sync action) until next time you turn the car on. (pt 8)

[1] http://blog.tyrannyofthemouse.com/2008/07/setting-sync-strai...

That blog post is from eight years ago.

I am currently driving a C-Max and some of your points aren't relevant:

- The dealer rep went to lengths to train me on the sync system even though I insisted I didn't need it. (Maybe it's different elsewhere)

- The USB connection is inside the cubby between the seats, so you don't need to leave mp3 players in visible locations.

- The sync activation is on the steering wheel, near the volume buttons, and is not at all difficult to tap.

All in all, Sync has a weird tiered command system which is why I don't use it much, but it's not for lack of physical design.

I know -- the point was to criticize how many serious blunders they committed in their initial attempt and which couldn't be blamed on Microsoft, to substantiate the point about poor UX expertise. Certainly, they eventually got it right 8 years later, but the point stands that they don't have some stellar in-house team.

This times 100. I have a 2011 Ford truck and hate the Sync system. It is absolute garbage, from blutooth syncing, usb syncing, to having a finicky mostly unusable interface. Add in that it was upgradeable for a while by myself, but then for some reason I had to take it in for $150 at the shop to get further upgrades.

I've been burned so bad, I'll only look at vehicles that support Carplay in the future.

They upgraded to a new major version of Sync either this year or last, and it's MUCH better (I recently rented a 2015 Expedition XLT). It's still MUCH WORSE than even Chevy's system, though, so ymmv.

Woof.

Right.

If you can't design a music system UI, what about something mission critical like the critical interface between human driving, and self-driving automation?

>That they aren't publicly sheepish about it suggests that the guys in charge don't even notice the differences.

My impression is that part of the 'being in charge' job is not acting sheepish, no matter how bad your product is, unless you have a solution that is dramatically different at hand.

Are you seriously suggesting that the music system should be considered part of an automobile's core feature set?

Personally, I'll swap a radio out in a heartbeat. A transmission, not so much.

Replacing radios has become far less common. Also, wheels and hubcaps are 'core' features that people often replace.

PS: Car people sometimes do end up replacing the drive train. One guy I heard about replaced everything until his gear shaft was the weak point and it ended up breaking.

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