sjgIS350

I've had XM for about a year now..I am pretty disappointed.

• Sound quality is poor. Nowhere near as good as CD or FM
• Not really commercial free. Including the so called commercial free stations. They still have tons of annoying ads for XM stuff and REALLY annoying things I will call promos. If you listen to Bluesville for example they have 'top ten rules of the blues', and even have their own song. I am paying for no-commercials. Apparently they its ok to do their own ads/commericals
• Music selection is limited. You end up with the same songs over and over.

primecut

iTrader: (1)

I agree. My car came with it installed as a dealer option even though I didn't care for it. I'm still in the 3-month free trial. Mine sounds like AM, and it keeps cutting out. Also, the interface is very clunky, and it's hard for me to find what I want to hear. I'm definitely not going to subscribe at the end of my trial.

steedis250

I still prefer XM over regular radio. However the factory XM sucks compared to aftermarket radios. I can't even see what's on other stations without actually tuning to them.

myculito

iTrader: (1)

Had mine for 6 months, and sound quality has been good so far. Radio channels are disappointing in quality.

There are channels like Squizz that play new rock that I never get a chance to hear on my local rock stations. I'm tired of commercials and local talk radio, which is where the XM shows its value. Also, when I'm backed up on the Florida Turnpike, I get to immediately find out what's causing the issue on the traffic channel....something I can't even count on my local stations for.

I guess it's not for everyone, but for me, it's been a must.

sjgIS350

Despite my whining, I will probably keep it...

I listen mostly to Jazz. We have a pretty good local/public radio station here KMHD.FM

No 'commericals' but they do have the 'brought to you by' syndrome, sometimes too much talking and programming I don't care for. Plus during quarterly fund raising time there is now way to listen unless you like hearing people ask for money..even after you give them some

Brian231

Make sure you guys manually cancel or else XM will send you a collections notice for the two months grace period BS they call it. It is a dummy company XM created to intimidate people. I paid 2 years in advance at $9.99. They kept sending me renewal notices and I pitched them because I traded in my car and the 2gen did not have XM. Then I was sent the notice, despite not being in a contract. I filed with the BBB along with hundreds if not thousands of others. Sirius for me from now on. Yes, I know about the merger etc, it is a matter of principal.

jimnordon

I think people expect too much from xm and sirius, they're radio, not an ipod. They follow a radio format with limited inturruptions, spend a commute with your local clear channel "home of rock and roll" and xm starts to seem ok. I've gotten almost all the way to work without hearing a song on terrestrial radio. Think of it as the difference between rabbit ears and cable, both are crap, one just has 10x the channels. And yes the s.q. could be better, and used to be before xm cut their bandwidth to add so many channels. Back when I first had xm, there was 110 channels and it really did sound as good as a cd. Now the avg bitrate is around 40kbps, I still have it in all of our vehicles, not great, but it has become a necessity. I pod thru "aux" sounds worse.....

ecr527

I've had XM in my car for a little over a year now. I've been finding myself listening to it a lot less lately, not due to them repeatedly playing the same songs over and over, but because I listen to XM at work for 8-10 hours a day, so a lot of times, I'll be listening to the Ipod or CD's in the car just to mix it up.

I have noticed however that although it sounds okay, does not seem to sound as good as FM.

kuuqi

nothing beats CD quality (well technically you could DVD quality too) in terms of general consumer products. you can only send so much data in a satellite stream and i highly doubt XM or sirius will bother to increase the bitrate (provided they have the technology/equipment to do it) to CD quality =]

IceZ

I love Sirius...I hate the interface they have for using it on the nav system. Its easier to use my stiletto to listen to the music not to mention it records music and saves individual songs. O ya scrolling thru the channels is a nightmare. It doesnt even scroll the entire name of the song or band you only get the first 8 letters or whatever.

gocubs08

I think it depends on the channels, I listen to BPM and some of the hits stations and the bass and sound quality is very good, almost as good as CD's for me, imo.. Now talk stations and others sound like AM radio, but I believe its becuase they dont operate them at full bitrate.