# Microsoft Sync Will Kill You



## Mumbodog (Oct 3, 2007)

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http://www.zdziarski.com/blog/?p=679



> In the audio below, it took me a total of three minutes and thoughts of suicide to assign a simple destination using MS Sync. I was forced to take my eyes off the road several times to read numerous lists of possible voice matches for city, street name, and more. Every time you hear, Please say a line number in the recording, Im actually reading through a list instead of watching where Im driving. After answering nearly a dozen questions, I had to end up touching buttons on the console, and later the navigation system screen to finally set the destination and accept an agreement to drive safely and obey all traffic laws. So MS Sync is sort of a voice-button-screen hybrid input, which Im pretty sure entirely defeats its purpose.


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## new tech guy (Mar 27, 2006)

Personally, i hate those in car technologies, All of that stuff going on in the dashboard is going to make it more interesting then the atcual road, therefore distracting the driver and just cause more accidents. Also, i look at all that tech and say, will my phone still use that bluetooth 10 years from now or will something better be out? Alot of outdated electronics then exist in a car that would be completely useless therefore making the vehicles more throwaway. Think i will just keep my analog gauges thank you very much. They always worked, nothing has gone wrong. Just like electronic throttle bodies? Who thought of this one? The cable system never let anyone down and has proven reliable....more electronics and technical stuff = more that can go wrong. Simple as that.


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## loserOlimbs (Jun 19, 2004)

new tech guy said:


> Personally, i hate those in car technologies, All of that stuff going on in the dashboard is going to make it more interesting then the atcual road, therefore distracting the driver and just cause more accidents. Also, i look at all that tech and say, will my phone still use that bluetooth 10 years from now or will something better be out? Alot of outdated electronics then exist in a car that would be completely useless therefore making the vehicles more throwaway. Think i will just keep my analog gauges thank you very much. They always worked, nothing has gone wrong. Just like electronic throttle bodies? Who thought of this one? The cable system never let anyone down and has proven reliable....more electronics and technical stuff = more that can go wrong. Simple as that.


Exactly my thoughts, why add a CD player when turntables have better sound!

I think the problem is that the manufacturers seem to be in charge of what goes into cars, not the consumer. Synch might be an OK system, but what if there were universal modular bays that you could add what you need, not rip out one things and add in another. That brings me right back to CD players, I hate having bad players in a car, and replacing it requires this kit, that harness, and those adapters. They should be more like PCI slots in a PC, you add what you want!

Then Blutooth, MP3 players and more can be used as they are trendy and neccessary. Instead right now I buy a brand new car that came with an "MP3 player USB port". Instead they lied and the USB only works with Apple iJunk, and my Zune has to use the stereo jack...


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## new tech guy (Mar 27, 2006)

That is the reason i just use the stereo jack limbs. I remember when i installed my car stereo head unit, they had to install some expensive jack "incase i wanted to put the factory stereo back in" well the cd player in the oem radio was broken so why would i reinstall that? Also, just with these electronics isnt it more dangerous to have a back lit dash that i cant see in broad daylight? What if those lights suddenly go out when im doing 80 mph on the freeway? Sure, it looks cool and sleek and modern and etc.....but the boring gauge is safer and much less likely to go. So i see this as an impending safety disaster...just go back to an older system that just works.


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## Mumbodog (Oct 3, 2007)

Yeah, I feel some technology should be like wheels, round and cannot be changed, or it just won't work.

This whole fly by wire in cars is just stupid and drives up the cost of a car, after all its just a people mover, save that crap for more expensive luxury cars, We don't need that stupidity on a Honda Civic, give us a break.

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## new tech guy (Mar 27, 2006)

Another thing i realized today thinking about this thread on the way home from school is the fact of that this could be a security issue too, like if all of these systems are connected, someone could write malicious code to perform some dangerous act with the car. Runaway cars? Yeah that cam happen, or a glitch could cause something to malfunction. The smart thing would be to sandbox outside apps in the car and things like phone connections to prevent this.


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## namenotfound (Apr 30, 2005)

loserOlimbs said:


> I buy a brand new car that came with an "MP3 player USB port". Instead they lied and the USB only works with Apple iJunk, and my Zune has to use the stereo jack...


Be lucky you have a stereo jack to do that. The dealer said "Your car will play MP3"  it does if they're burned to a CD! It only plays CDs with MP3 data on them, there is no jack to plug in an external MP3 player of ANY kind!


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## loserOlimbs (Jun 19, 2004)

namenotfound said:


> Be lucky you have a stereo jack to do that. The dealer said "Your car will play MP3"  it does if they're burned to a CD! It only plays CDs with MP3 data on them, there is no jack to plug in an external MP3 player of ANY kind!


I remember in the not so distant past paying $500 for a head unit to do exactly that! I thought it was the coolest thing, I could burn one or two CDs and drive 8 hours on them easy!


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## new tech guy (Mar 27, 2006)

I meant to note that the message that pops up about driver safety assuming he is on a test drive is on all gps units, my tomtom does this whenever it fully shuts down where i need to accept the agreement, also its possible you may need to train sync a bit to id your voice.


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## namenotfound (Apr 30, 2005)

loserOlimbs said:


> I remember in the not so distant past paying $500 for a head unit to do exactly that! I thought it was the coolest thing, I could burn one or two CDs and drive 8 hours on them easy!


You may like it, but I hate it. My iPod holds WEEKS of music. An MP3 CD can only hold a couple of hours...
If I'm going on a cross country trip, I'm stuck listening to the same songs over and over again.


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## loserOlimbs (Jun 19, 2004)

namenotfound said:


> You may like it, but I hate it. My iPod holds WEEKS of music. An MP3 CD can only hold a couple of hours...
> If I'm going on a cross country trip, I'm stuck listening to the same songs over and over again.


That was also a few years back, 5 cars later I have my Zune hooked up to the stock CD player of my car, and it works fine... I just have to use the Zune and not the in-car controls. And the USB port does charge the Zune.


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## namenotfound (Apr 30, 2005)

Well I'm talking about a car bought 2 years ago, didn't come with any audio port, just MP3 CD functionality. My brother's car is older, and his comes with an audio jack. I'm so annoyed....
When the dealer said "It can play MP3's" he should have specified what that meant!


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