SteveInNC
Well-known member
That's a satellite radio, the competitor to XM in the US. I got fed up with the sorry state of broadcast radio in my area (central NC), with a majority of the stations owned by Clear Channel. There was just way too much talk and advertising, usually synchronized such that even changing channels got you another ad or mouthy DJ. I bought a Sirius One unit, which is roughly the size of a radar detector, and comes with a car kit (magnetic antenna, power adaptor, remote, and various mounts).
<http://www.sirius.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=Sirius/CachedPage&c=ProductAsset&cid=1128803465284>
Sirius and XM are roughly the same in programming, and are the same price at $13/month. I bought my unit at Radio Shack for $50, with a $20 rebate until Dec 23. Online activation was $5.00. The unit has a built-in FM transmitter with user-settable frequencies, so it works well with your existing head unit. If your head unit supports audio inputs, the Sirius One also has analog out and the ability to turn off the FM transmitter.
The quality is comparable to what I expect from FM. I have a convertible, so road noise eliminates any point in having very high-quality signals. I'm very happy with the unit so far. I just threw the magnetic mount antenna onto the dash and used the suction-cup mount to stick the radio to the windshield. I'll probably go for a more-permanent mount tomorrow when I can see what I'm doing. The programming genres hit across the whole spectrum of music, sports, talk, news, and comedy. This particular unit allows 30 presets (as I recall) of the hundred or so channels. Sirius states on their website that they use statistical compression, assigning bandwidth dynamically as required by the various channels' content, so the quality should be higher than that of static bandwidth assignment.
With the holidays upon us, both XM and Sirius seem to have deals on equipment at the various resellers. Older units also appear to be selling at a discount.
With my limited experience so far, I recommend satellite radio. A friend of mine is a long-time XM subscriber and is happy with them, so I don't think that either provider would be a bad choice.
<http://www.sirius.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=Sirius/CachedPage&c=ProductAsset&cid=1128803465284>
Sirius and XM are roughly the same in programming, and are the same price at $13/month. I bought my unit at Radio Shack for $50, with a $20 rebate until Dec 23. Online activation was $5.00. The unit has a built-in FM transmitter with user-settable frequencies, so it works well with your existing head unit. If your head unit supports audio inputs, the Sirius One also has analog out and the ability to turn off the FM transmitter.
The quality is comparable to what I expect from FM. I have a convertible, so road noise eliminates any point in having very high-quality signals. I'm very happy with the unit so far. I just threw the magnetic mount antenna onto the dash and used the suction-cup mount to stick the radio to the windshield. I'll probably go for a more-permanent mount tomorrow when I can see what I'm doing. The programming genres hit across the whole spectrum of music, sports, talk, news, and comedy. This particular unit allows 30 presets (as I recall) of the hundred or so channels. Sirius states on their website that they use statistical compression, assigning bandwidth dynamically as required by the various channels' content, so the quality should be higher than that of static bandwidth assignment.
With the holidays upon us, both XM and Sirius seem to have deals on equipment at the various resellers. Older units also appear to be selling at a discount.
With my limited experience so far, I recommend satellite radio. A friend of mine is a long-time XM subscriber and is happy with them, so I don't think that either provider would be a bad choice.
