dseag2

I have the Terk XM antenna as well and have it mounted (magnetically) on the rear sidepanel opposite the radio antenna. My reception is excellent.

Robbo

OK-- I picked up a Delphi SkyFi XM unit for my wife's car last week (and a Delphi Boombox accessory for me ). Before I finished the install in her car, I took it in the Lexus and drove around for about an hour experimenting with various antenna locations. I spent a fair amount of time driving on a winding tree lined north-south road that I suspected would be problematic.

The Delphi has an antenna stregth screen that shows the signal strenth from both the satellites and terrestrial repeaters. As I suspected, there are no repeaters near me.

Here are the results:

Driver rear sidepanel: Multiple droputs
Rear deck (inside car): Unacceptable level of droputs
Trunk: No droputs
On the roof "bar" (the part of the roof that doesn't retract -- see jcmartz photos in this thread): No droputs.

So, unless the Alpine nstaller can figure out a way to get the antenna on the trunk without getting caught in all of the raising/lowering doohickeys (I'm suspicious), I'll be putting the antenna on the roof. I'm getting the small Sony antenna (2/3 the width and half the length of the Terk) and my car is black so it hopefully won't be too obtrusive.

I'll post pix after its installed.

Robbo

The installer spent about 15 minutes puzzling over the trunk before he gave up and we went to our fallback antenna placement, on the roof just over the windshield (the part that doesn't retract). We used the little Sony antenna which really doesn't look so bad and is helped by the fact that my car is black. I think the installer did do a good job fitting the Alpine remote display into the ash tray and he was able to put the fm-modulator and tuner behing the dash so I didn't lose any trunk space. I'll post pix in the next few days.

jcmartz

Thanks for the updates. I've got mixed feelings about the professional installer resorting to the roof-bar location. Part of me wanted him to find a way to do the trunk mounting but on the other hand, nice to know I stumbled onto one of the few acceptable locations for those of us in the booneys with no repeaters.

Please post pics when you get them. As I said when I posted them initially, the antenna doesn't look nearly as bad in person as it does in the photos.

Joe M.

Robbo

Pictures, as promised:

Robbo

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Robbo

..

jcmartz

Looks super. The Alpine head unit is a perfect fit for under the ashtray door. Gotta do something about your station selection, however. (yeah, I've got that channel on my favorites list, too)

Joe M.

Robbo

What can I say-- the awful 80's-- its the music of my generation. I'm sure when my kids are older they'll make as much fun of me with my 80s music as I did with my Dad's and his 50's music.

On the trip back and forth to work, I'm listening to 3 songs on every station so I can get a feel for the channel offerings (should take me about a month to work my way around the dial). So far I really like Fred, Ethel and U-Pop (in addition to the 80s channel).

I must say that I was pleasantly surprised by how good the XM radio sounds via FM modulation to the Mark Levinson. Not quite CD quality but real close. Maybe someday the folks at Blitzsafe or Pie will make a direct interface to the ML Lexus unit.

dseag2

Looks great! I have the Delphi Sky-fi running through the cassette deck, and the sound is pretty good. I've been waiting to do the install and I think the Alpine may just be the one.

80's and Fred are also on my presets. "Toejam" on the 80's channel is the best. 6:00pm and 12:00midnight EST!

Robbo

In terms of functionality and usability, I think the Delphi unit (I got one for my wife) is far superior to the Alpine. Aside from the fact that the screen is smaller and can't display as much info as the Delphi, the Alpine only has 12 presets and Alpine, in their infinite wisdom, only made six of them accesible from the head unit (you need to use the remote to get to the second set of presets). The Delphi boombox accessory is way cool too.

On the other hand, I think that the Alpine via FM mod sounds better than the Delphi via cassette and it looks far better installed in the SC.

YMMV

dseag2

Robbo, after seeing how great the Alpine looks I'm ready to trade in my Delphi Sky-Fi for a permanent installation. However, I have a couple of questions:

-Did you just install a head unit in the ashtray with an FM modulator or was some another unit required as well? I checked into this with Sound Advice, and they showed me something that looked like an amp as well. What exactly was required?

-I see you did the roof mounted antenna installation. Where do the wires run inside the car? Back of the dash up the inside of the windshield pillars?

I'd love to know. Thanks.

Robbo

The XMA-T200RF has 3 pieces. The remote display (head unit), the FM modulator and the XM tuner. My installer put the head unit in the ashtray and the other pieces behind the dash (he told me actually behind the glove compartment). I assume the wires run from behind the dash and up the roof pillars but I'm not excatly sure. I certainly can't see any wires anywhere.

As I noted above, you will probably miss the SkyFi-- it just has so much better functionality. Too bad there is no way to do a clean install with SkyFi into the SC.

Here is a link to the Alpine manual:

http://ecominet2.alpine-usa.com/html...-t200rf_om.pdf

SeattleIS300

i put my xm antenna inside the dash of my is300 on the left hand side it works perfect!! i understand this isnt a SC just giving some idea's

Joe

Robbo

If you are in a city or other location with terestrial repeaters, an antenna install inside the car will work. Once you leave a repeater area and are only able to get the signal via satellite, a dash mount will have drop outs.