I wanted to get satellite radio for home and car. I lease my car so i gues i can get a window antenna. But, for the home I was told that I have to have the antenna near a window facing south. i wanted to also use for the office. But, i do not sit near a window. i know they have 'boomboxes' to put your satellite tuner in. These boxes have speakers and antenna inside. Do I stillhave to have the boombox near a window to hear the radio or can it be OK in a regular office? Which is better XM or SIRIUS
Satellite
Don't know about the antennas, but I have listened to both Sirius and XM and was shocked at how awful Sirius sounded. Be careful to check this out before going with Sirius, make sure you are happy with the sound, I myself couldn't stand it for more than 10 minutes. XM sounded ok, not nearly as offensive.
Don't know about the antennas, but I have listened to both Sirius and XM and was shocked at how awful Sirius sounded. Be careful to check this out before going with Sirius, make sure you are happy with the sound, I myself couldn't stand it for more than 10 minutes. XM sounded ok, not nearly as offensive.
I just bought a new car with a Sirius reciever and a year free service. Sounds like well stirred ****. Imagine a $10 cassette recorder held up to a computer speaker playing a 32K MP3, then listen to the tape on a $10 Walkman. I'm most dissapointed. The programing is good (well, better than the commercials on broadcast FM), but the SQ is below par, way below par.
Is XM better? Does anyone have any technical specs on the system and bitrates of both?
Honestly, it sounds worse than a 64K MP3, maybe a little better than a 32K MP3, but not much. It's such a shame that corprate amaerica thinks we are all deaf with bad taste in music.
Is XM better? Does anyone have any technical specs on the system and bitrates of both?
Honestly, it sounds worse than a 64K MP3, maybe a little better than a 32K MP3, but not much. It's such a shame that corprate amaerica thinks we are all deaf with bad taste in music.
I have sirius, and yes - at home it doen't sound all that great, but as a unit for my truck, driving on servicecalls through the canuck boonies north of wherever it is unbeatable. It beats no reception or highly compressed fm anytime, not to mention the lousy selection the few local stations play.
I have my antenne not facing any window, just try to find a position for exceptable signal strength anywhere in the room.
I have my antenne not facing any window, just try to find a position for exceptable signal strength anywhere in the room.
Hi,
I have XM in the truck and Sirius in the home off of Dish. I am into smooth jazz and classical. Anyhow, I like the Sirius over XM programming hands down. IMO, Sirius has the radio type atmosphere while XM reminds me more of a CD jukebox. Sound quality, well I feed Sirius into a Fisher 400 receiver and really like that sound. XM sounds ok, but, between road noise and kids, can’t get a real feel. However, I don’t like the XM programming. XM really needs to get a real smooth jazz station. Just my opinion.
Regards,
ck
I have XM in the truck and Sirius in the home off of Dish. I am into smooth jazz and classical. Anyhow, I like the Sirius over XM programming hands down. IMO, Sirius has the radio type atmosphere while XM reminds me more of a CD jukebox. Sound quality, well I feed Sirius into a Fisher 400 receiver and really like that sound. XM sounds ok, but, between road noise and kids, can’t get a real feel. However, I don’t like the XM programming. XM really needs to get a real smooth jazz station. Just my opinion.
Regards,
ck
Check out this. I emailed asking what bitrate they broadcast because it sounds awfull. This is their reply
Dear Brian,
Thanks for your recent email. We appreciate the time you have taken to
contact SIRIUS in regards to our bitrate. Currently at this time our
system is using a 34 Kbs bitrate. We understand any inconvenience this
may cause. We are trying to accommodate listeners of all types. We
hope this information helps.
We are committed to providing you with the best in customer care. If
you have any more questions, please feel free to contact SIRIUS
Customer
Care. For your convenience, we are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a
week at:
If you plan on listening to this rot on anything other than a background PA over the $4.00 5" speakers without the wizzer mounted in the ceiling, save your money.
Dear Brian,
Thanks for your recent email. We appreciate the time you have taken to
contact SIRIUS in regards to our bitrate. Currently at this time our
system is using a 34 Kbs bitrate. We understand any inconvenience this
may cause. We are trying to accommodate listeners of all types. We
hope this information helps.
We are committed to providing you with the best in customer care. If
you have any more questions, please feel free to contact SIRIUS
Customer
Care. For your convenience, we are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a
week at:
If you plan on listening to this rot on anything other than a background PA over the $4.00 5" speakers without the wizzer mounted in the ceiling, save your money.
This thread is a year old or so:
Wondering if anyone has figured out a way to get decent quality from this equipment?? Does either XM or Sirius have channels with more bandwidth?? Anything better than the 33 Kbps happening??
Is this a case for local broadcast digital radio >> better sound?? Is the local "HD Radio" any better in reality?? Anyone know the bit rates / bandwidth for "HD Radio"??
Wondering if anyone has figured out a way to get decent quality from this equipment?? Does either XM or Sirius have channels with more bandwidth?? Anything better than the 33 Kbps happening??
Is this a case for local broadcast digital radio >> better sound?? Is the local "HD Radio" any better in reality?? Anyone know the bit rates / bandwidth for "HD Radio"??
Never mind, bad news = a rant
" ... HD Digital Radio supports CD-quality sound as well as song titles and artist names. And because the digital signal piggybacks onto a conventional broadcast signal, it is free to the listener. ..." ( From: http://www.hdradio.com/how_does_hd_digital_radio_work.php )
This is a sad state of affairs ... a tremondously misleading and purely self engrandizing promotion of a worthless "new" technology: "CD-quality" is NOT better than regular broadcast FM ... Those few FM stations that take to trouble to broadcast vinyl start out with a better sound than "cd-quality".
Can you imaging radio station programming directors who actually care about the quality of their broadcasts falling for this ripoff??
I can see how a greedy board of directors might fall for it = digital radio of the "HD-quality" has to be very cheap to impliment ... its just a matter of getting the buying public to believe they are getting something "better" = "There's one born every minute .."
The only thing gained by this broadcast "standard" ("HD" digital radio) is that it overcomes the multiplexing problem of analog FM radio signals ... As long as these broadcast stations are doing a makeover of their signal quality, they should have made simple provisiions for something better than "cd-quality" ... How about 24 bit / 96K DVD-A or at least SACD or better? All FM broadcast media have the ability and the analog bandwidth to support 96k digital.
" ... HD Digital Radio supports CD-quality sound as well as song titles and artist names. And because the digital signal piggybacks onto a conventional broadcast signal, it is free to the listener. ..." ( From: http://www.hdradio.com/how_does_hd_digital_radio_work.php )
This is a sad state of affairs ... a tremondously misleading and purely self engrandizing promotion of a worthless "new" technology: "CD-quality" is NOT better than regular broadcast FM ... Those few FM stations that take to trouble to broadcast vinyl start out with a better sound than "cd-quality".
Can you imaging radio station programming directors who actually care about the quality of their broadcasts falling for this ripoff??
I can see how a greedy board of directors might fall for it = digital radio of the "HD-quality" has to be very cheap to impliment ... its just a matter of getting the buying public to believe they are getting something "better" = "There's one born every minute .."
The only thing gained by this broadcast "standard" ("HD" digital radio) is that it overcomes the multiplexing problem of analog FM radio signals ... As long as these broadcast stations are doing a makeover of their signal quality, they should have made simple provisiions for something better than "cd-quality" ... How about 24 bit / 96K DVD-A or at least SACD or better? All FM broadcast media have the ability and the analog bandwidth to support 96k digital.
Bandwidth..
Is it me or is the 'quality' of sound actually taking a turn for the worse??? The audio quality of the simple telephone has degraded so far as to make conversations almost unintelligible...(Yes my hearing is OK)......Case in point was the quality of my old "brick" cellphones audio...it was very good...volume, audio spectrum & dynamic range...listening to the current crop of devices..they sound terrible. Perhaps since the size of the drivers are shrinking & the output power is being trimmed back....no wonder the ads say...."Can you hear me now?"
When they started development of the CD they gave it room to grow ...to improve quality in a purely statistical way. Not so with the current crop of audio devices...they are stepping backwards.
I believe the crux of this sad migration is the desire to free up more bandwidth. The FM band is relatively small but TV takes up a huge chunk of the available bandwidth... I recall the FCC said TV broadcasts will soon be a thing of the past as the bandwidth is to be reshuffled with new & terrible sounding stuff as more and more information is crowding into a fixed usable range of frequencies.
Is it me or is the 'quality' of sound actually taking a turn for the worse??? The audio quality of the simple telephone has degraded so far as to make conversations almost unintelligible...(Yes my hearing is OK)......Case in point was the quality of my old "brick" cellphones audio...it was very good...volume, audio spectrum & dynamic range...listening to the current crop of devices..they sound terrible. Perhaps since the size of the drivers are shrinking & the output power is being trimmed back....no wonder the ads say...."Can you hear me now?"
When they started development of the CD they gave it room to grow ...to improve quality in a purely statistical way. Not so with the current crop of audio devices...they are stepping backwards.
I believe the crux of this sad migration is the desire to free up more bandwidth. The FM band is relatively small but TV takes up a huge chunk of the available bandwidth... I recall the FCC said TV broadcasts will soon be a thing of the past as the bandwidth is to be reshuffled with new & terrible sounding stuff as more and more information is crowding into a fixed usable range of frequencies.
" ... The audio quality of the simple telephone has degraded so far as to make conversations almost unintelligible (Yes my hearing is OK) ..."
You are absolutely correct: I'm about ready to drop kick my cell phone through Cingular's front window. Maybe that new Apple 'phone project will have a little better sound quality since the engineers are the same as for the iPod ... wishin' & a hope in' & crossing fingers.
" ... When they started development of the CD they gave it room to grow ...to improve quality in a purely statistical way. Not so with the current crop of audio devices...they are stepping backwards. ..."
You got this right too: sat. radio is total craipola. HD radio (looking at the specs) doesn't even come close to vinyl broadcast of old.
" ... recall the FCC said TV broadcasts will soon be a thing of the past as the bandwidth is to be reshuffled with new & terrible sounding stuff as more and more information is crowding into a fixed usable range of frequencies. ..."
I do notice that Internet radio has bandwidth potential that a very few "stations" take advantage of. When perusing the iTunes list of radio stations, Apple was good enough to include the bandwidth of each station available from their short lists. However when searching the web for alternates, one seldom sees the actual specs. Examples: Virgin Radio (UK) is 192k (supposedly), yet the links available here in the states are a pispoor 32k = ... Of course this assumes that a 'Net "station" that indicates 96k or 192k bandwidth is actually playing something better than 44k ... usually not =
You are absolutely correct: I'm about ready to drop kick my cell phone through Cingular's front window. Maybe that new Apple 'phone project will have a little better sound quality since the engineers are the same as for the iPod ... wishin' & a hope in' & crossing fingers.
" ... When they started development of the CD they gave it room to grow ...to improve quality in a purely statistical way. Not so with the current crop of audio devices...they are stepping backwards. ..."
You got this right too: sat. radio is total craipola. HD radio (looking at the specs) doesn't even come close to vinyl broadcast of old.
" ... recall the FCC said TV broadcasts will soon be a thing of the past as the bandwidth is to be reshuffled with new & terrible sounding stuff as more and more information is crowding into a fixed usable range of frequencies. ..."
I do notice that Internet radio has bandwidth potential that a very few "stations" take advantage of. When perusing the iTunes list of radio stations, Apple was good enough to include the bandwidth of each station available from their short lists. However when searching the web for alternates, one seldom sees the actual specs. Examples: Virgin Radio (UK) is 192k (supposedly), yet the links available here in the states are a pispoor 32k =
... Of course this assumes that a 'Net "station" that indicates 96k or 192k bandwidth is actually playing something better than 44k ... usually not = - Status
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