I am about to start driving 110 miles a day to & from work. I want to get satellite radio. Which do you think is better - XM Radio or Sirius? Why? Opinions, please!
I like opera and Americana-type music - Emmylou Harris, Lyle Lovett, Ryan Adams, Bob Dylan, Neko Case, etc. Sirius seems to have a much better offering of that type of music. They even have WFUV’s Meg Griffin doing the folk music channel.
What do you know about the relative future of the two competitors? I remember when I had a Betamax. Superior to VHS, but Beta died through bad marketing decisions. I don’t want to get stuck with the next Betamax installed in my car!
I have XM and think highly of it. Your mileage may vary.
I also think that XM has a brighter future. In addition to being the ‘first mover’ they have the marketing partnership with General Motors. XM is standard on some GM cars for 2003 and 2004 and they just announced that it’s becoming standard on an Acura model, too. That’s an enormous help in acheiving the necessary subscriber base for survival. Sirius has some auto partnerships, too. But I don’t think it’s as fundamental as General Motors.
In addition, XM is rolling out models that are designed for home use. I’m hoping that will help as well.
As far as programming I think XM has a wider range of interests. Sirius appears to have more world music than XM but XM has things like the Old Time Radio channel and Discovery.
I think we’re pretty much all agreed that only one of these firms is going to make it. I’m hoping it’s XM. But that’s just me.
You can listen to about 2 hours of programming (on a loop) of each XM Channel at www. xmradio.com.
Hell, I’m partisan. I love XM. I have a 50 mile (each way) commute every day and I haven’t grown bored yet.
Be warned though. When you’re dealing with XM you’re dealing with ClearChannel. While that gives XM some extra pull in landing artists (appear on XM or our 5 billion channels won’t play your song) for special appearances they are the devil.
I looked at Sirius but when I purchased it wasn’t yet rolled out so I wasn’t really serious (HA!) about it.
Many factors went into my XM decision (I could have waited). Not least among them was the utterly irrelevant to you fact that XM is based here in Washington DC. I do try to support our DC-based tech companies.
Also, one of my favorite Jocks, Lou Brutus, runs a channel on XM. That was a factor as well.