Dodge is adverstising free Sirius.

It seems that there is a lot of heresay going on with this thread that I want to clear up. I have XM and absolutely love it. The quality is noticeably way better than FM and if you think the quality is sub-par, then you probably should not be listening to music in a car, especially a 7th gen Civic with all the road noise lease: , and besides all the musisc stations, I like listening to CNN, Comedy Channel, Discovery, VH1, E!,....also, some people will appreciate that satellite radio is not censored. All the F words and the like are still there as the artists intended ... and then some.

Before I got XM, I also thought that paying for radio would be stupid, but after trying it, I'm downright sold on it and I will NOT give it up. Just look at regular TV compared to cable or Direct TV. A similar comparison.

How can you guys take the commercials of FM and AM? There's so many commericials that I'm disgusted. It's like all I get is propaganda. Even the music played on FM is tiring...same playlist over and over again made up by large companies like Clearchannel or Infinity Broadcasting catering to music industry's desire to have the next band or singer reach popularity. Ugh!

Sirius has two satellites (which they own) that are in CONSTANT ORBIT which means that you will get signals blocked in underpasses, and in many cases can only connect with one of the birds in the sky. XM has 2 STATIONARY satellites (which they also own) at each coast and terrestrial repeaters in large cities which means that you can pretty much connect to both birds most of the time...one of the reasons I chose XM. I rarely ever lose my XM signal.

Financially, I would say that Sirius is hurting, but XM is going pretty good although both are extremely in debt due to the startup costs involved with lauching satellites, and introducing something so new to the public. Give XM a few years, and they will be making profit up the a$$ after they get more subscribers.

As for hardware, I have the Delphi Skyfi unit which I have hooked up to my stock deck in my 02 Civic EX Coupe. I recommend NOT using the FM modulator, but an auxiliary input adapter which fakes out the stock deck into thinking it's an accessory CD changer. That way, the signal is still as clean as it came out of the sat radio. These can be found from PIE Electronics or Blitzsafe.

One minus to satellite radio is that it broadcasts for the whole country so you can't get (at least not yet) local traffic reports, or local weather, although XM has a weather channel that broadcasts weather for all regions. The only reason I listen to regular radio these days is only for traffic reports.

If you think that Sat Rad is a fad, just look at all the OEMs offering it in new cars and trucks.

It's just too good of a thing!

Check out my install pics:

http://photos.yahoo.com/bc/tom0826/l...+Album&.view=t

Noticed you had your xm antenna inside your car in the install pics, nice job by the way. Does your xm seem to get good reception with the antenna inside the car? If so its a great idea and i will try that. Thanks. by the way...XM = AWESOME. The pro of having the same station all over the country....on long drives you never have to **** around with stations every 45 minutes of driving....thats the reason why i originally got it, i take trips from md to nj and ri biweekly. Its nothing short of awesome

who has the xm antenna inside their car?

Yes, I have the antenna inside the car on the rear speaker tray. Works great for me, and will work fine as long as it has good sight to the sky, ...like a hatch-back or a 7th gen civic coupe. I also have 20 percent window tint, but it must be non-metallic window tint for it to work. I really hated the idea of having the thing protruding on the roof, and trying to wire it to the receiver.

-Tom

Since this got revived, I may as well post in it too. I just installed XM today, took me 30 min, and another 5 to activate, and I absolutely LOVE it!

Does anyone else subscribe to the playboy channel? I did, and so far it just seems to be talk radio like howard stern type stuff...does it ever play anything else? If not, i'm gonna cancel that station.

i was goin to subscribe to it, but it sounded like a bad idea. Who needs the distractions of people having sex coming through ur stereo during rush hour?

I subscribed to it, it sucks in my opinion, dont waste your money or your time listining. I kept it for 3 months and never heard anything good. That is just my opinion though, if someone else has it and likes it please post. I just never heard anything besides TALK, i was hoping for mabye some radio ****...to much to ask lol. Peace

Yeah, that's what I was hoping for too....like I said, it appears to just be talk radio...i'll listen for a month and see if there is ever anything else on it, and report back here

On Sirius, we have "Club Pam Radio" which is probably about the same, but no extra subsciption required

Can you listen to Hockey/Baseball/Football Games on XM Radio?

Nevermind, I found out.

I have an XM-ready Pioneer deck, so how much does it cost to get the other stuff to enable it? (Excluding monthly charge)

does anyone here have the audiovox or JVC portable tuner? I have an Alpine deck that is XM ready but I want a portable sirius tuner that I can use through the AI-NET cable (aux-in) with either RCA or 3.5mm (headphone jack) connections.

If I understand right, both can be used in home or car.

I want sirius because they have picked up broadcast rights for local NFL broadcasts starting this fall.....

FOX broadcasts NFL, and they're part of XM broadcasting...

Tom, where you are located I'm sure it works well. I can't imagine that in upstate NY though, I'd get a clear enough shot of the sky with the antenna installed inside, especially when I'm headed South. Comments...?

BTW...great install! Any thoughts on the Roady model from Delphi? The price is right and I could always use the FM mod now and install the adapter later.

As far as I know, the only advantage I have in living near LA is the large amount of terrestrial repeaters that are supposed to help in such areas with tall buildings, or use indoors.

Most of the time I get great reception from both satellites (XM has one on each coast) when using the satellite signal display. Although it's hard for me to predict how it will work for you in upstate NY, I doubt there will be any problems with mounting it inside the car as long as it sees the sky...and that's kinda being generous. The antennas seem to work suprisingly well especially on the rear deck or the dashboard.

Why not at least try it inside the car before mounting it outside?

BTW, the Roady seems very similar to my Skyfi except it's not portable. As long as it's meant to stay in the car, I think it's a great value. And the FM modulator will probably work just fine.

I was just in a local Tweeter earlier today and I was impressed with Sirius over XM - Sirius has Fox News, a plus for me, and for those who were talking about the Playboy Channel on XM, you all seem to be right...I don't wanna hear people gettin it on while I'm driving unless I'm somehow actively involved. Plus, for the puckheads out there, Sirius has NHL Live, awesome 5 day/wk 2-hour talk show during hockey season. My first audio upgrade after I return from deployment is probably gonna be new speakers and a Sirius setup, probably a disc changer too to replace the OEM single disc.

It's XM that has the two sats. From thier FAQ:
As a resident near Baltimore and DC, I can attest that the rock radio scene here really and truly stinks. There are three "alt-rock" stations: WHFS, WWDC, and WIYY and thier playlists are virtually identical... with a 50 to 60 % crossover with the mix stations.

Just today on my XM, I heard old school Eric B and Rakim, brand new Helmet, Boy Hits Car, A cover of the prog rock Rush song La Villa Strangiato....the Blend Crafters, Fear Factory, Kittie, as well as brand new bands like Submersed, Somnia and Jad ... and the list goes on....

I commute 90 minutes each way and XM has been an absolute lifesaver. If you spend a lot of time in the car, it's really really worth it.

From sound quality, the dynamic range of the XM broadcast seems wider than the commpressed FM broadcasts of the major stations in the area.

^^^ I second that! I still love my XM and I have had it for about a year and a half.

i have both in my car...the perks of working at an electronic retail store. IMO, i like sirius over xm, i like the stations better with sirius, i think it has a better variety and the nfl games aren't bad on sundays either. i too live in the baltimore/dc area and honestly they both have great reception in the area, only problems i have is when i go through the tunnels in b-more.

If I switched, does the antenna from my Roady work with any Sirius equipment? I doubt it, but it would make the switch so much easier.

I doubt it - I think all the satellite equipment is proprietary.

Where did you see that they filed bankruptcy? I've looked for it at work in our federal public records database and never found it. It be impossible to file multiple BK's in the time that they have been a company, it's not legal, so I doubt that they have. The only thing I found is that they threatened in mid 2002 but were able to raise enough capital from new investors. The lifetime subscription is just good business due to securitization requirements and the value of the $400 (future value), by collecting it now rather than over 4 years.

I have Sirius and love it. Yeah, some of the songs sound like bad MP3's, but for the most part it sounds pretty good. I had XM in my Tahoe and it was pretty much the same thing but with more signal interruptions and a shitload more commercials, so I switched when i put it in my Civic. I am in outside sales and travel all around the country in my car, so it's a very good investment for me. Like someone mentioned before, I haven't bought a CD or paid to download a song in 18 mos, so it's paid for itself. Besides, I get tired of the 10 song playlist from the local radio stations. Better now though is that I get all of the Cowboys radio broadcast no matter where I am.

EDIT: Sorry dudes, just realized it was a super old thread.

You guys have me all depressed now. My alpine is "XM ready" I think this means I can control an xm receiver from my head unit. Is it possible to hook up a sirus tuner to an alpine hu (using ai-net or something) so I can use my head unit to tune xml stations?

Well I guess. They always have those fm modulated ones. Quality won't be as good, but the direct link wasn't all that great to begin with. Stick with regular radio imo or cd. Best there is.

tbaleno,
don't frett...go to crutchfield.com, sirius came out with a tuner that hooks into your ai-net, believe it's 79.99, hope that brightens your day.

Yes it does. However, I notice it says 2004+ alpine head units. Is this just a case of them not checking for compatability of with older units? I also notice that alpines new head units say satelite ready instead of xm ready. I'm kind of worried that it won't work with my 3 year old head unit. Also is that unit all you need to get sirius? I see kits for xm that are like $300.

Thanks, if it works with my head unit at least now I have an option. It seems the only site that has any info on this tuner is crutchfield.

call crutchfield up...for the most part, their customer service is pretty good. i'm still debating myself whether to get xm or sirius for my girl, she has an alpine also, waiting for terk to come out the the alpine smart adapter for their tuner but who knows when that will come out. just playing the waiting game now.