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Don't know squat about satellite radio. Going to get swmbo setup for her b-day since she can't get the kind of tunes she likes local. So, which is better XM or Sirius? Any recommendations, commentary appreciated!
 
I got a sirius kit and it sucked. Bottom line, you're going to want to hard wire it to the reciever or else you will be dreadfully let down like I was.

Greg
 
XM all the way. In-Laws had free Sirius in their new vehical for a year and couldn't stand it. To me, the variety is much more diverse on XM then on Sirius. But it depends on what you're looking for. Any friends have either? Test them out and see what feels best.
 
Greggy said:
I got a sirius kit and it sucked. Bottom line, you're going to want to hard wire it to the reciever or else you will be dreadfully let down like I was.

Greg

I got an accessory port on the car radio so I think I'm good there. So did you just return or did you go XM?

I only got one friend that I'm aware of that has XM and he loves it but don't know much besides that... Looks like price is about equal between the two?
 
I have Sirius, but I have one of the earlier units (tee hee, "unit") that has the stronger FM transmitter (before they started cracking down on the strength of them). With the newer ones, I would definitely recommend the accessory port since the transmitter isn't so good anymore.

I also got a free 3-month trial of XM when I bought my car ... that was built-in so I can't speak to the transmitter aspect of it.

Music-wise, it seems like XM has more selection. But they didn't have a Jam band channel, so that was one thing I noticed missing.

If you like listening to Howard, go for Sirius. If you like listening to MLB, go for XM.

I would say sign up for free trials of both (Sirius has a free 3-day trial, and I would imagine XM has something similar) and see what you like better.
 
XM all the way here. Have had both and think XM is much better. Plus I found Opie and Anthony way funnier than Howard Stern
 
I received an XM for Christmas. I've never even thought about satellite radio until now but I think it is pretty cool. I like the specialty channels for the different decades. I get good reception with it and have lost the signal only once when we were in a Vally up in the mountains.
I don't like the antenna that has to be placed outside the car. This might be true for Serious as well I'm not sure. I routed the wire from my trunk to the dash board under moldings abd trim. XM comes with a casset adapter but my car has a CD player. I had to get an adapter that connects with the car antenna to play the XM through the car stereo.
 
My sister and dad have XM, my mom and I have Sirius. Pretty similar. I'm a fan of Howard Stern, so I got the lifetime subscription back when it was $499 (same as paying month to month for 3.5 years). Now the lifetime is only $399, which is a good deal if you plan on using it for more than a couple years. Lifetime is actually the lifetime of 3 units (they also charge a $75 transfer fee), so I recommend buying a nice first receiver if you decide to go this route to avoid upgrading and burning though it. I haven't checked, but its likely XM has a similar deal. My first unit was great, no reception problems (wasn't even hardwired). Then 6 months ago some theives broke into my car and stole it, so I bought a cheapo receiver. Luckily Sirius waived the transfer fee and didn't count it against me after I faxed them the police report. But for some reason my reception sucks now on this new unit, even after I hardwired it. I'll probably pony up and get another unit soon. I agree with the previous posts that the deciding factor between the two companies should be based on what you're into. XM has Opie and Anthony, but Sirius paid $500 million for Stern. Hes number one for a reason, worth the subscription price alone. But thats just me.
 
Jumbo82 said:
Lifetime is actually the lifetime of 3 units (they also charge a $75 transfer fee),

That must be unique to either the lifetime membership or to the US. I got a receiver for Christmas last year and it only lasted the one year under a teenage onslaught. I bought another one this year, right after renewing my quarterly subscription, and there was no charge to transfer the account to a new receiver.
 
Fingers said:
That must be unique to either the lifetime membership or to the US. I got a receiver for Christmas last year and it only lasted the one year under a teenage onslaught. I bought another one this year, right after renewing my quarterly subscription, and there was no charge to transfer the account to a new receiver.

Yes, in case I wasn't clear, I was refering to the lifetime subscription. The lifetime subscription isn't for the lifetime of the owner, its for the lifetime of three receiver units. So if you buy a new unit, you can transfer your subscription over to the new unit, but you will pay $75. After you do that three times, your "lifetime" subscription ends.
 
why not wait until the merger goes thru?? he-he.

I've had both XM and Sirius, Sirius being the underdog has by far impressed me the most.

XM has great music selection and Opie and Anthony are funny (despite what Stern says) altho, I wasn't too fond of O&A returning to regular radio to do a "pre-show"... the restrictions of regular radio just really put these guys and every other "shock-jock" out of business...

I had XM for 2 years, I got much use outta the boombox and home setup, it was nice... XM has baseball (if that's your thing) and I found the music selection to appeal to just about everyone.

My XM unit was stolen and I canceled my subscription... then I bought a Sirius right before Stern made his Official move in January of whatever year that was. I enjoyed the Sirius and I found that I liked the programming more than I did XM's, altho they both offer great music so I don't think you will go wrong...

Sirius has Stern if you are into that, the Playboy channel, Maxim Radio, and Football.... not to mention great programming as well..

Pricing is about the same and the both have the same retarded customer service...

I just recently canceled my subscription due to my unit having some issues and some account issues I was having that could never seem to be resolved.

Unit Issues : My connection had been failing on my unit, so I had called customer service and after a painful 52 mins, we came to a somewhat-solution... so they sent me a new antenna free of charge and even credited my account for the lack of service...

once the new antenna was hooked up things were working fine, but I know my receiver has gotten it's share of abuse and all the moving in and out of the car has taken it's toll on the poor thing....

Account Issues : I could never log on to my account through the website, I had tried to change my address and contact info but it kept going back to my original settings, and I didn't like the online radio function, for some reason I had 3 different log in names and only one of them worked for the internet radio and nothing else...

Customer Service was meh, I have only called them 2 or 3 times and each time is less than stellar...

I've been listening to Sirius for about 3 years and after 3 years I can say that I really enjoyed the radio, but the despite the programming being awesome, like having too many TV channels, I find myself flipping though stations getting sick of hearing the same stuff.... perhaps after this cancellation I'll get a call to renew my subscription for 1/2 the price or something :D

I need a new head unit and right now I'm very happy with Pandora.com...
 
Greggy said:
I got a sirius kit and it sucked. Bottom line, you're going to want to hard wire it to the reciever or else you will be dreadfully let down like I was.

Greg

This is kind of broad. Can you explain further?

I've had a Sirius mobile reciever for about 4 years now. I love it. I can take it from my car to the house with no problems.

I love Sirius, hated XM. Sirius has better music, better comedy, and better sports. XM's only saving grace is the MLB games, but that is it, trust me.
 
Dude said:
This is kind of broad. Can you explain further?

I've had a Sirius mobile reciever for about 4 years now. I love it. I can take it from my car to the house with no problems.

I love Sirius, hated XM. Sirius has better music, better comedy, and better sports. XM's only saving grace is the MLB games, but that is it, trust me.

yeah the built in FM Modulator for the sportster worked great for me... i never had any issues with that.
 
I've had Sirius and XM both for decent amounts of time. Sirius has NFL and NASCAR. I would chose Sirius over XM but there really isn't much difference. I would be more focused in researching the unit you are going to buy. My Sirius unit is waaay better than the XM one I used to have. The sportster 4 is great.
 
Sirius all the way.

I'm a huge Howard Stern fan (O&A are Stern ripoffs without any of the intelligence or interviewing skills), and if you are into that sort of thing, you do get Bubba The Love Sponge on Howard 101 on Sirius. Theres a lot of cool programming on Stern's channels actually. I like Scott Farrell as well, which is kind of a foul mouthed sports show.

I also listen to a lot of the NFL channel on Sirius plus NPR, BBC 1, the CBC.

The Playboy channel and Maxim pretty much suck. Really vapid stuff.

Raw Dog comedy is pretty great. Jim Breuer's show is pretty good stuff.

For Music, I love "Little Steven's Underground Garage". I'm blown away by the stuff they dig out on that channel. Really cool garage rock, punk, soul, old blues...just all around cool stuff. Other than Stern and the NFL I listen to this channel the most.

I also listen to a lot of the Metal and Hard Rock stations and "Left Of Center" for the indie rock/college stuff. Their other "Alternative" channels are pretty mainstream.

----

I have some XM stations on my Direct TV. Its ok. A couple of their music channels are pretty great. I like XMU a lot. But overall, I think you just get more bang for your buck on Sirius.


--------

Hopefully the merger goes through and the gov't quits shilling for the FCC and commercial CORPORATE radio and then we can have the best of both worlds.
 
+1 for Sirius

Listening to Howard now.

I've had the 2nd generation Sportster for a couple of years. Love it. No problems.

I put set of rabbit ears in the atic connected to the FM OUT port. Not only can I get Sirius from any radio in the house, but I can pick up the signal a block away in my car. Free Sirius for the neighbors!
 
Sirius all the way! I'm an old radio raccoon from the early sixties, but I still prefer newer, more eclectic stuff.

Sirius Disorder is the best ever! A lot of the jocks started in NYC on WNEW when it was a free form no format radio station, and they are still cool!
 
Guess Sirius wins. I'm going to get the Sportster 5 unless someone informs me different. Any advantage/disadvantage from going to a local store to get this (if stocked) or is Sirius online better to nab deals/sign-up incentives?

So, I got two cars - guess I need two antenna's eh?
 
DesertBrew said:
Guess Sirius wins. I'm going to get the Sportster 5 unless someone informs me different. Any advantage/disadvantage from going to a local store to get this (if stocked) or is Sirius online better to nab deals/sign-up incentives?
I've only ordered from the Sirius store, but they've been good so far. I think AAA offers a discount on Sirius if you go through their website first.

DesertBrew said:
So, I got two cars - guess I need two antenna's eh?
I would actually get 2 car kits (including the dock and power cord as well). Otherwise, if you just have 2 antennas, when you want to switch radios you'll need to: unplug the antenna & power cord from the back of the dock, move the unit, dock and power cord to the 2nd car, then plug them all back into the second car. By having two entire kits, you can just pull the unit out of the dock and move that from car to car.
 
I have XM just because of baseball when Im driving up north for work I cant pick up any games because there all on AM until I get to Detroit so I just got an XM, plus I like to listen to Hannity and Bruce Williams.But I think the music on XM sucks because I hear the same song 4 or 5 times a day.
 
DesertBrew said:
Guess Sirius wins. I'm going to get the Sportster 5 unless someone informs me different. Any advantage/disadvantage from going to a local store to get this (if stocked) or is Sirius online better to nab deals/sign-up incentives?

So, I got two cars - guess I need two antenna's eh?

like mentioned, get the 2 car kits, no sense in the hassle of swapping cables around.. the sportster has great mobility.

the sirius site usually has good deals... i typically only buy from the site.
 
Ended up buying the sportster 5 online. It had an ad saying subscribers get it for 50% off. So I created a login and they gave me the 50%. That didn't make me an official subscriber but worked for me!

Will do on the 2nd car setup. Didn't get that today since they wouldn't give me a discount on that with the initial order.

Thanks for the info all.
 
My apologies Dude.

But we all know what party/administration has it's mitts all over sweetheart deals like this.


After all they have Paulson at Treasury working "OVER THE WEEKEND" and are on top of the current economic situation.
 
Bernie Brewer said:
I already pay for TV. I'm not about to pay for radio too..............

+1

i've listened to both in the vehicles we rent out. not a big fan of commercials on the satellite radio, minus well listen to the terrestial radio.
 
I was getting so tired of listening to the same 24 songs in rotation on terrestrial stations. SWMBO is a huge music lover and she has been bitching about how crappy the radio had been. So I got SWMBO a sirius tuner for mothers day. This thing is bad ass!
I listen to everything so the variaty is just insane. I was one of those 'Im not paying for radio!' but you get wat you pay for, should have done this a long time ago.

I about dropped a brick listening to the punk channel and heard some obscure stuff we use to see at the small local shows. I was so stoked I went home and ordered one for my truck ;)
 
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