Someone on another board asked me to compare the 08 nav on our previous feh to the 09 nav in our current feh.

I am posting this information as MY opinion. If you disagree, SHARE IT, but please don't FLAME it.

Let's keep this thread civil. After driving the 09 abit more, I will probably be posting OTHER differences in the two model years, unless I get a bunch of crap for sharing this comparison.

ok here goes, just our observations (wife and I)

The hev screen was much easier to read on the 08. The battery level meter was larger and easier to read also. (the 08 had a battery that filled up green) the 09 has a little bar meter you can barely see.

When requesting hev info on the 09, you must hit the info button then the hev touch screen button. On the 08 you hit one info button and it went right to the hev screen.

The hev screen on the new unit is also delayed compared to the 08. When the ice starts on the 09, there is a delay before the inst econ drops from 60 to actual. On the 08, the inst econ was much more sensative to changes.

Also, the orange writing on the "home screen" with the 09 is very difficult to see on the blue background. It was light blue or white on dark blue and easy to see at a glance.


The 08 was a 6 disc, the 09 is only one. Yes we know about the "jukebox" feature. It's a pia to load the music.

The 08 did not have sync, but we have found the voice controls to be completely useless. The sync picks the wrong choice 98% of the time. Both my wife and I have done the voice recognition and with or without, the system really does not work at all for us.

The sync plays my daughter's ipod fine, but it will not charge it.

We have tried four other usb devices and one usb player in the usb port and none of them work. (unecognized device message).

With the 08, the time and date always stayed on the "top" info center regardless of the radio being on or off. With the 09, as soon as you turn the radio on the time and date disappear, yet they DON'T show on the radio (without pressing buttons), this REALLY is a step backwards for us.


The 09 navigation has LESS streets than the 08 did. where streets used to show on the 08, the 09 now says unknown name or something similar.

One change we like in the 09 is the three screens in one (we just wish the mpg wasn't in orange). The sync bluetooth phone connect works GREAT with our Motorola Razr v3c. (the hands free part, NOT NOT NOT the voice command part. Asking it to call BOB and having it call DAD is NEVER a good thing (insert panic to hang up before the call goes thru).

The sirius ALWAYS worked in our 08, it worked for one day on our 09, but we are hoping the new radio on order will fix this and it will last longer!!!

There are some significant improvements on the 09feh, I don't feel that the nav/sync system is one of them.

Sean

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I'd hate to say I expected to see problems with the new system, but sounds like typical Microsoft defects ;-) Really surprised to hear that the iPod is working better than the other usb players though. I'd guess that they didn't include the standard powered usb port (opting for the low-powered laptop type instead) so it doesn't provide enough power to charge. It is really a shame that Ford didn't have the resources (or will) to provide their own bluetooth system. I would prefer the iPod specific dock connectors found on other cars with an available aux port for other devices. I'd love to have been able to see the track info on the top radio display on my 08 with an iPod. They really should provide that with Sync as an "upgrade" option. I would guess that the Sync system will not play any tunes purchased from the iTunes store since the system plays the songs from the iPod as a drive (not the ipod playing the tracks through the system) and as such cannot play tracks with DRM wrapping? What about synching an iPhone with the system? Sounds like the NAV system is now running Windows Mobile/CE? Are the map views any different? Sounds like a real downgrade if there are less streets in the database.

Thanks for the comparison review.

2008 Ford Escape Hybrid - Adopted 7-7-07

I have to say that I almost completely disagree with you on the 09 Nav. I will admit that that I have not had very much time with the 08 Nav, but right away I think the color scheme for the 09 is much better than the 08.
The only problem that I have with the voice recognition is when I ask for a song that is very similar to another song. I have a lot of songs with close names. Other than that I would say it is accurate 98% of the time. As for using iPods I don't know which ones you are using but I have used my 4th Gen and iPod Touch and only had two problems. Sync can't play purchased songs or playlists from my 4G iPod. Other than that it works great every time.

Honestly, Sync was the main reason that I ordered an 09 instead of getting an 08. The other improvements were icing on the cake that I found out about after I had ordered mine.

Here is some more info based on the responses:

My daughter's ipod is a nano.
It plays purchased songs (from itunes) with no problems, it just doesn't charge it.
I tried using the sync much more for phone than for music, but didn't have luck with either.
Sync playing the wrong song is MUCH less embarrassing than when it dials the wrong number or contact!!

I think the less colors on the 08 actually made it easier to read at a glance as opposed to the "prettier" colors on the 09. I think the 08 was just greyscale.

On the plus side, the 09 plays DVD's great, we just need a hack to get that working while moving. (I know why it's blocked out). The 08 did not play dvd's.

I noticed that on other nav/sync systems they are able to CHOOSE from several color schemes.. WHY can't we do that on the FEH??? (they have a button for it)...
I would love to try some other ones to see if the mpg stands out more to my eye!

Sean

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I will say that I have had no problems running SYNC with my Ipod (5.5) - it charges it and recognizes music purchased through Itunes...Make sure to run the SYNC My ITunes program first (available through syncmyride.com)...

Here's a compatibility list. There are many iPods listed but I would check their firmware level against this list first and upgrading to the one listed (or the newest available) before writing off Sync.

Same here...my ipod Nano is recognized and charged as well.

Sorry to hear about the views on the colors but I personally have no problems whatsoever with the readouts or accessability of the system. Granted I have not played with the '08 but I think this comes down to a personal choice. Good luck!

Burns,

How did you log into syncmyride.com?

Not only don't they list the escape, the site also does not recognize escape vin numbers?

Please share your trick with us!

Sean

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When I click on that link, I get the message website unavailable.

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I still haven't been able to log in to syncmyride - but you can down load the Sync My Itunes software without logging in - go to the FAQ section and look for a referrence to Sync My Itunes and it will have a link to where you can download it.

http://www.syncmyride.com/Own/Module...aspx?tagId=131