Tested: Ford’s new infotainment system

Anyone who knows Sydney inner-city traffic – or for that matter, traffic in most of Australia’s major capitals – will understand there is an unspoken rule for Friday afternoons: avoid the area completely by car.

The rabbit warren that is Australia’s most populated city is particularly troublesome come beer-o’clock, when the early starters are fighting their way out and the early evening starters (read: party crowd) are fighting their way in.

So, then, if you were to try and test a new infotainment and navigation system, this would be the most opportune time. And ironically, it is the very situation we find ourselves in while testing Ford’s new SYNC3 software this week. Friday afternoon, just before peak hour hits.

The software, introduced in the Focus small car and Mondeo from August, brings Apple CarPlay and Google Android functionality to Ford for the first time, along with better voice activation and automated calls to emergency service in the case of an accident where airbags are deployed or the fuel has been cut off. Ford has also used SYNC3 to re-acquaint customers with AppLink, facilitating the use of non-Apple and non-Android services such as Pandora and Spotify.

The system fitted to our Ford Focus Sport presents very nicely in the skin. The dashboard’s centre fascia is very minimalist, with far fewer buttons than the switchgear-laden SYNC software which first debuted in 2007. The stereo links in nicely with the eight-inch screen, which is crisp and clear in its resolution and has been modelled loosely on the modern smartphone, with pinch and zoom functionality and intuitive finger movements.

The home screen is split into three zones – Navigation (if equipped), Audio and Phone, which are configured in a tile-like layout and sit above a “quick access” menu along of the bottom of the screen, giving entry to functions such as the system settings. It is certainly a simplified set-up compared with the predecessor SYNC2 software.

Accessing the system is straight-forward. Simply pair your phone using Bluetooth (which we do) or plug it into the USB port via cord to begin using CarPlay or Android Auto.

Set the task of covering off five different locations in order to learn the system, we punch in the first marker point in our phone, which is mirrored on the car’s screen, but later learn you can do the same process via SIRI voice command, simply pressing a button on the steering wheel and saying “navigate to Bondi Beach”. You can also utilise the vehicle’s hard-wired sat-nav, which uses predictive typing to shortcut the destination entry process.

The system is intuitive and easy to use. Taking a wrong turn quickly re-directs us to a better route and traffic is also keenly considered – a major coup for Sydney commuters on a Friday afternoon.

The car’s voice activation also cleverly extends to finding coffee shops, playing a song or even text messages; you can listen to or read text using the same steering wheel mounted button, a huge step in the way of safety and discouraging texting while driving.

“Don’t be afraid to throw a bit of Australian at it,” Ford’s Australian marketing boss (and American-accented) Lew Echlin jokes - we do and it responds.

The Ford system isn’t perfect though. For example, the main eight-inch screen isn’t connected with the corresponding digital display in the driver instrument cluster as well as it could be. As such, it is not possible to scroll through your phone’s song list, for example, as you would in a new BMW or Audi. In addition, the nav threw a couple of directions that were firmly advised against by one Sydney occupant riding shotgun. The biggest let down is that the system isn’t offered with built-in Wifi that would allow you to use the car as a hotspot (it has a Wifi functionality which allows you to update the car’s software, but that’s about it).

In some ways, this probably won’t be the final version of SYNC3. Ford says it has the capability to update the system via user updates, just as you would on a smartphone. This will be the same across Mustang, Everest, Ranger, Focus ST and Focus RS, which are all due for SYNC3 before year’s end. Sadly, the Fiesta city car doesn’t have a screen that is compatible with SYNC3 so it misses out for this generation.

Ford’s senior applications engineer, George Christopoulos said the latest software was based heavily on customer feedback.

“It’s about bridging the gap between driving and staying connected with the outside world,” he said.

“We’ve got over 15 million vehicles on the road today with SYNC. There’s been a massive request from customers to include this in their car. We’ve got feedback from customers that this does affect their buying decision, so we do take this seriously.”

All in all, Ford’s new system is one of the better infotainment offerings going. Sydney traffic isn’t exactly the place you want to be on a Friday afternoon, although the process seems much less stressful and convoluted with Ford’s SYNC3 software on board.

Ford SYNC3 rollout:
August: Focus and Mondeo
September: Mustang, Everest and Ranger
November: Focus ST and Focus RS