Man!!!! I Thought i was the only one who had issues with XM Radio.
i use it for talk radio, but then i was sent a notice saying that my monthly
fee would go up to i think $235.00 because of artist royalty fees's and that is when i got TIDAL streaming, then i found out that not all the good music was MQA ( JAZZ FOR ME) then i lost interest in TIDAL because i was lied to, then i found out that LG made a Cell phone with a built in DAC chip that plays MQA Model V30 AND G7 has a 32bit quad dac. i fell back in step with my music. |
I just got a trial SiriusXM in my new Subaru Forester. Obviously not like top line Mercedes or BMW quality system-I’ve had them :) However, I’m finding the sound quality very good for car radio in this vehicle. Very happy to have the variety that’s just otherwise available in the Vancouver area of BC. I think it a no brainer for country folks : ) and May keep it if sweetie like it ; )
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How can you compare radio to cd Dude!! |
Sat radio had such promise but its just as repetitive as the worst Iheart or Clear Channel offering and its EVERY station. Too many channels also are sucking the life out of the audio quality. Had it for a couple yrs in very start of its roll out but its not good enough to justify. |
I gave it a try, got tired of the dropouts (it is line of sight to the sat, so signal is lost constantly around here. Then I put in a cd, listened to that for 5 minutes, never turned on sat radio again.
I also had to fight them to turn it off. I had completed my 2 yr. agreement, told them in writing I did not want to renew. They renewed it anyway and kept charging me. I called them and got an ear full of how it is my fault for not cancelling properly. However, they could not tell me what "properly" meant, but agreed to cancel my acct. Charges kept coming. My bank agreed to not process their attempts at whacking my card so they were cut off. Then the collection agency called. I explained the situation, the collection people agreed with me and that was the end of it.
That's my experience with sat radio. No thank you. |
I too enjoy Sirius...mainly listen to classical. First, if are enjoying in the car then the extra 3 dollars to stream at home is clearly a winner. I use it all the time on my Ipod touch and stream the digital into either an HRT Istreamer or into a Marantz SA8004. No not like a great CD or SACD but still good in my opinion. Maybe me but the classical stations sound better than the and other selections.
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Classic 95 said it well. After my experience w/them I will never ever do business w/them again. Proceed w/caution. Nightmare to cancel and billing issues. I could go on and on, but do some research on the internet and you can read all about them. As far as sound quality, I thought in the car it was fine. Not worth the hassles though. |
Slacker radio sounds acceptable plus its fully customizable with creating stations, skipping songs and even fine tuning how dig they deep into a artist or genre. Its a great program. Sound and interface is better than Pandora. |
It's OK for listening in the car, but comparing it in my car to both FM and CD it is not nearly as good. It seems to have a brightness and hashy highs to it now that I never noticed in my last car (traded in during March). Still, for listening on the road in a non-critical environment it's acceptable. |
Just returned from an errand in the car and focused on the quality of the SiriusXM and have to say it was pretty good. I don't think it would be fair to place all the blame on the signal. Surely, the car audio system has to be partly responsible. That said, I am not disputing the earlier comments about the low quality signal as heard on a high end system. |
I have a Kenwood DT-7000, which is a stand alone home only Sirius Tuner. I am running the toslink, (the only digital out it has) to a Eastern Electric MiniMax DAC. The sound is really quite enjoyable.
It's not as good as MOG or Pandora, (through a Squeezebox Duet) or my Olive 04HD all running through the same DAC, but I still enjoy the sound.
I don't use it as much now with all the internet choices, but it still comes in handy. |
Have had SiriusXM since I bought my car earlier this year. I've never noticed the inferior sound; but that might be because I'm always singing along with the music in the car. My expectations for quality sound in the car were never high. Whereas with my home system, I'm glued to my listening chair and focused on every nuance of the music coming through the speakers. I love both listening experiences! |
I had Sirius in my last car which I traded in 11-11. From 2007-2010 the quality was OK for the car - not great but not too bad either. In 2010 or maybe early 2011 they did a channel re-org and added more channels. This seems to have increased the amount of compression used, and the Sirius became virtually unlistenable, even casually. Sustained vocal, guitar and piano notes would actually wobble a bit in pitch, and there was a lot of distortion. It sounded a lot like a cheap cassette deck. Both my car radio and the home unit I bought gave similar results.
I didn't do Sirius in my new car and cancelled service on the home radio I had. |
"05-14-12: Gz3827
Also, if you have never subscribed to Sirius before, be aware that they are a nightmare to deal with if you decide to cancel (at least that was my experience and also the experience of a close friend).
Gz3827 (Answers | This Thread)"
No comment on the sound quality but I couldn't agree more with Gz3827. Several years ago I had gotten this for my mom, after a few years she said she didn't really use it that much anymore and I should cancel it. The day after I did they took it upon themselves to sign me up for a life time membership and then immediately sent me to a collection agency. Luckily I had documentation of everything and the collection agency was pretty cool (I imagine it wasn't the first time this happened) nonetheless I would NEVER do any business with this company.
Cheers,
Wes |
Bummer. I was hoping I'd hear nothing but glowing praises of SiriusXM. My system is currently down while I hunt for a new amp; but I was looking forward to taking advantage of SiriusXM's wide selection of music when it was up and running again. Wife and I love it in our car; so, I thought that getting it for the home stereo would be a no brainer. Now you guys have dashed my dreams on the rocks! As to service, Gz3827 is right. I had a horrible experience with their customer support yesterday when I had a simple tech question. Was on hold forever, and when I finally did have a techie answer, I got kicked back on hold 10 secs into my question. I did receive an apology to a critical email I fired off to them. But their customer service definitely needs improvement. Anyhoo, thanks for your input. |
perhaps gratioutously, i'll add that although xm/sirius still advertise that they're "cd quality", they're not even close--they sound tinny and compressed even on great equipment. i'm inevitably surprised on the rare occassions i listen to fm at how much better fm sounds than xm. can't fault xm's programming, however--still can't live without it. |
+1 for TPReaves, Gz3827, and Charles1dad.
For a rough comparison and ignoring codec issues, etc.:
Sirius internet radio premium specs a bitrate of 128 Kbits/sec (Kbps).
Pandora radio premium -192 Kbps
Standard resolution MP3 -100 to 192 Kbps
Highest resolution MP3 - 320 Kbps
PCM from Compact Disk 1411 Kbps.
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I agree with Tpreaves, a 'good' RBCD setup is much better. |
I can't speak to playback through a home stereo system, but when I had Sirius for the car, the sonic quality of the Sirius was really quite poor in comparison to the sonic quality of redbook cds. Also, if you have never subscribed to Sirius before, be aware that they are a nightmare to deal with if you decide to cancel (at least that was my experience and also the experience of a close friend). |
No where near the quality of a well recorded RBCD, IMO. |
