[stevelup]

I don’t think it’s Microsoft’s fault that Ford didn’t include two lines of code and a relay to dump power to unneeded circuits when the vehicle is unoccupied!

[rikur_]

Must be a Ford thing, there was an earlier bug where, when you open the drivers door to exit, the dash prompts you whether you want to inhibit the alarm .... if you didn't click 'ok' to disable the alarm, then the dash stayed on and drained the battery.

More seriously though, avoid Fords with the 'powered by Microsoft' badge - the usability and stability is awful, for example:
1) because of the live tile design, the same amount of display is given to map/sat nav as telling you the aircon is set to 20'c - I don't need 25% of a 8" display telling me something I never change!!
2) The menu navigation is awful (over 10 taps to change from my wife's phone paired to my phone paired if I suddenly want to answer a call)
3) Some bits they obviously didn't finish (e.g. some of the screens have a heading of "Sync.Resource.Title").
Later models are powered by RIM, much much better - but ironically I barely use the RIM interface because the RIM version supports Carplay and Android Auto.

[rikur_]

Update on the battery - apparently I might have too much music, or a corrupt music track

Apparently there is a bug in Ford's Sync system where although the radio looks like it is switched off, it gets stuck in an endless state of trying to index your music ... until the low battery voltage protection cuts the power to the radio. Removing the USB stick is apparently the answer. We'll see in a few weeks if this advice is true.

Having removed the USB stick, and done 20+ hours of driving since, the battery condition has returned to normal, and I have heated screens again