DistortedEdge

My MFT and Sync Services (the part where your calls Sync to get traffic and other info) have been working fine for a couple of weeks; I was actually thinking of showing off how useful "Services" are to my friend. Every day, first thing I get in the car is say "Services" then get the traffic to my destination and perhaps the News - Top Stories or the sports scores. Just when I thought the system was stable and reliable it's back to its old finicky behavior today. Get in the car, say Services, it dials, but once connected, the system can't understand my commands. When it finally does, it can't figure out my location, and then it disconnects. Call back, dead silence for three minutes after saying "I'll get that for you" before it disconnects without giving the traffic. Same thing again and again and again. Often I hear multple digital data transmissions (like modem noises) over the speakers. My phone's log shows 7 phone calls (from 2-5 minutes each) to Sync Services this morning before I finally got an actual traffic report. Of course by then I was already half way to work and had committed to a certain route. Very frustrating. I suppose it's more likely a bad phone connection than anything else, but my phone showed five bars and the voice was clear when it spokes. Sometimes it just seems like the system is temperamental or suffering mood swings. Just wanted to vent, not sure anyone can suggest how to address this other than try again later when it acts up, but it would be interesting to see how many people use Services routinely, and if they ever have these kinds of problems.

No, you can't, not yet. About all you can do now is have the car act like a wifi hotspot and share the 3g connection (via wifi) to other devices in the car. A web browser and other internet stuff are "later release" features (aka vaporware).

I was on the highway yesterday approaching an off-ramp, going about 15 mph and a couple of car lengths behind the car in front of me when all of a sudden the collision avoidance warnings go off (audible alarm and the red LED bar under the windshield). I was in no way at risk of hitting the car in front of me, and the system's never gone off in similar situations in the past. However, I did glance in my rear-view mirror and noticed that the guy behind me was going awfully fast and was awfully close. It really seems like this was what set off the collision alert, but I thought the system only scanned forward while in Drive. It does appear to scan backwards and sideways while backing up, so the sensors are there. My "safety" concern with the scenario I had is that if the system does what the documentation says (pre-charge the brakes) this is the opposite of what it should be doing if someone's going to rear-end me. As a driver, I usually speed up a little if someone's about to rear-end me to give a little more buffer. Bigger concern, though, is that my first instinct when the alarms went off was to hit the brake, which would not have been a good idea. Has anyone else seen behavior like this? I have to admit, that despite reading some docs on the system, I'm still not 100% sure about what sets if off; I've tried to create some scenarios that do, but it's really difficult, and yet other times, it goes off when I feel there's no risk.

I did scrutinize the remote, no name, but I also found the document card that came with it (picture attached). It's definitely SureStart. They must use some standard off the shelf remote, because the instructions talk about the connect/re-connect buttons, but the actual remote has a lock and unlock button. I'm not sure which will act as connect, LOL. Hopefully I'll never have to find out. On the other hand, since the SureStart disconnects the battery from the car, this may serve as a very useful feature if the MyFord Touch/Sync system gets screwy and needs a fuse pulled. I could just disconnect the battery with the remote! No more crawling and contorting to get to the fuse box. Maybe I can actually put my fuse cover and kick panel piece back in place. :-/ Original Poster: Damn, that tow truck story you just posted really sucks. Hopefully the system was damaged by the bad attempts to jump start. 44 minutes?!!?!? After five they should have just towed.

Yeah, apparently so. The fact that it had a second remote should have been a clue to me. I can't even find the documents that came with it, and still can't recall what it was called. Guess I'll have to call my dealer and ask. Seems like a nice add-on to have in light of the Ford's built-in "battery saver" is apparently buggy to some small amount.

I'm referring to the remote in the attached picture. LOL. Obviously it's not the "Battery Saver" feature of the car, after looking up what that is. This might be a dealer add-on to my vehicle. I can't for the life of me remember what it was called, "sure start" or something along those lines I think. I'll have to look in my papers for the car when I get home. In essence, there's some kind of special attachment, or maybe it's even the battery itself that maintains a locked reserve of battery juice that's enough to always allow you to start the car. It came with this remote, which I keep in the glove box. If the battery is ever dead, I can supposedly click the remote to unlock the reserve power and start the car. There's supposed to be a manual way to do it on the battery as well. I'm a little annoyed with myself for not having the instructions to it in the glove box. It seemed simple enough after reading them to not need to keep them in there, but looking at the remote now, I don't understand why there is a lock and an unlock button on it. I'll post more details if interested once I get home and can check the documentation.

Which model Edge do you have? My 2011 Limited has battery saver technology. The car came with a little remote to activate it. I assumed this was standard feature on all models. For the rest of us, looks like we need to visually glance at the screen when exiting the vehicle now. Bummer, just another worry to have with the new car. I wonder if using the alarm remote to lock the doors rather than touching the handle has an impact on this one way or the other.

I know it's a hassle, especially when I rides are concerned, but it's disappointing to read that someone is satisfied that their system has been "fixed" when it clearly still has issues, albiet minor ones. If it were my car, I'd be back at the dealer insisting they get it right, or at least pointing out that they need to let Ford know there are more issues. I guess compared to non-working, constantly crashing, etc, some color controls not being displayed properly really isn't a big deal at all, but it still shows Ford/Microsoft haven't fixed all the bugs yet, or worse, have introduced new bugs as part of the fix.

What model/version are you talking about? My 2011 Edge Limited doesn't have a key, so can't put it into accessory position (LOL). Do you mean the outside temp?

I stand corrected on my statement that "no one's reported it". But seriously, even the poster says it's not the "real" version per Ford engineers the dealer was chatting with. I have to agree with Wilsons66604 on this one. It's not listed as official on SyncMyRide.com, we have no idea what it is, neither does the one who posted it, or what it addresses. When Ford or Microsoft contact me and say "there's an update available at your dealer to correct known issues with MFT" it'll be real, until then it's not, at least from my perspective. I don't care how they notify me, could be a letter, call, or just an update in SyncMyRide saying there's updates I need to get from the dealer. If numerous others here who have reported issues with their systems start coming here and posting that they got fixed by something, I'll re-think my position. Bottom line, I am driving a car I don't trust to have a reliable Sync system in it. My butt still puckers every time I turn the key wondering what feature isn't going to work today. To be fair, though, it's been over a week since a system crash or fuse pull type incident occurred.

Yes, there is definitely an audio alert. You might play with the settings for the system. Maybe you have backup alert turned off. I believe it's accessible on the left hand joystick/screen. It's also in the settings for the car on the MFT panel, but you have to dig deep to find it. If you have it enabled and aren't getting audible alerts, it sounds like you have a glitch that needs repair.

1.3 is the latest official release for the Edge. I'm not sure about other models of auto that don't have MyFordTouch installed. I don't recall any kind of About screen deep in the menus of the system, but I'll double check later today. The only way I know of to confirm your version is with the USB stick program from SyncMyRide.com.

Bah! I've been driving for 35 years and never caused an accident. I am more than competent as a driver, but I've had a couple of close calls since getting the new 2011 Edge. The MyFord system's bugs and glitches ARE distracting, and subtle enough to distract you without you noticing. I've had to make a conscious decision to train myself to ignore most of the MyFord stuff while driving. It is a safety issue, whether it's driver competency or not - you now have a big flashy system with lots of stuff going on at once on multiple screens in front of you with many of them not working the way they are supposed to. This is clearly LESS safe than none of that going on, and many drivers may not be up to the task, making it a safety issue in at least a small way. If the system were more responsive, and less buggy, it would be far less of a concern. Even if you argue that it's not a safety issue that's Ford's fault, that won't change the bad press and media hysteria that could happen if lots of people start having accidents and start blaming being distracted by MyFord as a contributing factor. Right or wrong, the media sharks will have a feeding frenzy when some little girl is ran over by a distracted Ford driver. To the guy saying there's a service patch for this out, count me as one of the "I'll believe it when I see it" crowd. No one here in the forum has reported actually receiving it yet. Even if some reports come in, from a personal point of view, it's still vaporware until my dealer has it and allows me to schedule an appointment for installation.

Yeah, pretty lame excuse...

You have to make sure your browser on the phone is in "classic" mode and not "mobile" mode. Be advised that even on wifi the classic mode of google maps is painfully slow, even on state of the art phone like my Samsung Galaxy S. EDIT: to get to classic mode, scroll to the bottom of the web page where all the little fine print is and there's a side by side link for mobile and classic. In classic mode, just scroll over to the right of the map and there's the send button, just like on your computer. I doubt you need flash player support (which can be added to Android phones on 2.1 in some cases), because Google is a big supporter of HTML5. I'm not sure, though, and am not challenging or disputing anyone on this. Also, please correct me if I am wrong, but my understanding (I think from one of the documents I've read) on the Services directions from Google maps is that the directions aren't sent to your system, only the end point, and the car's internal navigation does the route calculations. A subtle difference, but I've found in prior models of Edge with Sync that Sync's routes rarely match Google's routes for the same trip; if this is still true, any printed map you bring from Google with you may not show the route your car chooses to guide you on.

I never said the web browser not being there was false advertising. I called a promised upgrade in the context of they have a lot of code they need to get this system to the specs they bragged about last year when MFT was announced.

It would be very useful for those who have a MyFi or an Android phone that acts like a WiFi hotspot if some of the features of MFT/Sync could take advantage of it. Some possibilities: 1) Services would be more reliable and not use voice minutes. I've gotten by for years on a 500 minute phone plan with my voice phone, but with frequent use of Services in the car, I'll have to use the phone with unlimited minutes, or at least substantially more than I have. 2) The car could feed data back to the traffic reporting network (like Android phones do for Google Maps, or the Traffic! app on iPhones). More use of location to get traffic on your route without having to make the effort of calling Services to as. Or report incidents, etc. 3) Vehicle health information reports could just upload over the net automatically at specified intervals instead of manually with a user initiated voice call. 4) Apps and upgrades could download, install and confirm over the air instead of screwing around with the USB stick and the SyncMyRide website. 5) Let me report gas prices back to the system from the car while fueling to make them more accurate (like GasBuddy app on iPhone/Android). 6) Let me report speed traps as a warning to other folks (like the smartphone app for that). The possibilities are as endless as they are on a smartphone, which has a lot more function in may ways, with a lot less space available for screen, battery, memory, cpu, etc. I had thought that MyFordTouch would end the need to use my iPhone or Android phone for all my needs in the car, but it's not close to that yet. Edit: of course those without unlimited or large cellular data plans, or no data plan at all, may find this a problem and prefer the voice/modem method. Since none of these features even occur with the USB dongle cellular connection, they're a long way off. Maybe that app development kit will allow for this sort of stuff in the future. Hope so.

Well, yes, the car already does what you're saying, but that's using BT PAN or USB stick for cellular connection, and it makes sense in that regard, and the car should broadcast as a WiFi hotspot to allow non-cellular connected devices to access the internet. This doesn't at all address what I'm asking though, which is what's the point of having the car connect to a WiFi hotspot, wherever it is, at this time? None that I can see. Once connected, nothing changes in the car or the devices in the car. Internet, Services, etc aren't suddenly routed over the car's WiFi connection to bypass cellular data.

Welcome to the club! Yes, it's one of the MANY problems with the current version of MFT/Sync. I'll believe a software OS is coming when I see it available from official sources publicly. Until then it's just second hand stories from people who've spoken to tier 1 support folks as far as I can tell. There must be some sort of memory leak or corruption with the system that builds to the point of total instability as things get used. I wonder what OS kernel Sync uses (some version of Windows?).

Agreed. I've seen a few posts across the Edge and Sync forums where people say you can Sync Services over WiFi instead of voice, but if that's correct, it eludes me. I think those people are just making assumptions and haven't tried it.

One problem with perusing forums like this is that they're mostly populated by those who have an issue/problem/gripe. There's the die-hard fans who just like to talk the product, but you're almost always going to get a negatively skewed bias reading a forum like this. I'm sure there are hundreds of thousands of Edge owners with no problems that would never even think to come online. I've been a member here for three years, but hadn't logged in at least two until I picked up the new 2011 Edge and noticed all the issues. I've had mine 13 days, under 300 miles on it. That's another issue with mine I haven't posted yet. Really have to press hard on my touchscreen from time to time to get it to register a touch, sometimes so hard I can see and feel the panel bending with the pressure. Would you be so kind as to jump over this thread, inspired by your quote above, and comment? Thanks. http://www.fordedgeforum.com/index.php?/topic/6039-whats-the-point-of-the-wifi-connection/page__view__findpost__p__47655

I'm lost with this feature on the car. What's the point of connecting the car to the home's wifi network? I can't figure out what this is supposed to enable. I don't even really see the point of wifi at all if the car can't use the connection to pull data, and if it does, I can't figure out what data it pulls and how. I suppose if your phone shares its internet connection via WiFi hotspot, and the car can actually use the data, it makes sense while out and about, but if you're connecting that way to share the cellular signal, there's not much point, since the other devices in the car could just tap right into the phone. Maybe if you have more than 5 devices and your phone/MyFi has a limit to connections, but it just seems very limited to me and kind of pointless at this time. Are there features "coming soon" that make having the ability to connect to a WiFi hotspot that make sense, or are there current features I'm not understanding? Thanks.

I'll believe it when I see reports of people actually having it installed! Could be next week, could be next year. Aren't there a lot of advertised features on the system that aren't actually there yet, as well? I'm thinking about a web browser that was bragged about, and getting Sync Services via WiFi instead of voice calls. Seems like they have a lot of bugs to fix as well as promised features to add.

Steve, I'd actually considered doing the same thing!

Did the rest of the Sync system die along with the camera? That happened to me last night. Fuse pull required to reboot the system. The number of problems with the Sync are ridiculous. I'm not at all pleased with it. To the original post - My camera blacks out for about a second or two a few seconds after it turns on. Annoying, but doesn't really impact function. Yours blacks out and doesn't come on at all again? Considering how many things you need to pull the fuse on Sync to fix, it would have been considerate of Ford to put the fuse box someplace where you don't have to get knees on the ground and twist and contort your head and hands to get into the fuse box.