Ford S-MAX

Living with a Ford S-MAX SECOND REPORT Seven-seater’s impressive voice recognition tech puts our man in presenter mode

WHENEVER I take the wheel of our Ford S-MAX, I have this uncontrollable urge to do an impression of an announcer from the pre-war British Broadcasting Corporation. I clear my throat, practise my best Received Pronunciation and speak clearly and authoritatively, even when there’s nobody else in the car with me.

Have I lost the plot? Some might say I never had it in the first place, but what I’m doing is taking advantage of Ford’s SYNC voice recognition software, which is standard on our S-MAX. It’s designed to make life easier for the driver, as you press a button on the steering wheel and speak commands that the SYNC software recognises, instead of trying to fiddle with the buttons on the dash, which can distract you from driving.

You can wow passengers by talking to the car and have it obey your commands as a female voice responds, although it only works with a list of pre-prepared phrases that the system understands. The list of phrases is pretty comprehensive, though, and you can control the temperature, make phone calls, set a sat-nav destination and select music this way. One source of amusement is to ask SYNC ‘What’s playing?’ when listening to music – the system’s set phrasing means some artists and song titles can sound pretty bizarre when compared to their normal pronunciation.

While I feel the need to speak clearly – maybe having to deal with automated call centres has conditioned me – I have tried to test the system by mumbling commands. I’ve also put on different foreign and regional accents (making sure nobody is within earshot!), yet you have to be really incomprehensible for the system to trip up.

It’s all very impressive, but there are some frustrations. First up, although you can make phone calls, there’s no facility to read out or compose text messages, while other makers already offer this function.

Another is the length of time it takes to use SYNC – each time you want it, you press

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