[Dwayne Gorniak]

I have been a Sirius Customer for what seems like forever (many years). I have become tired and extremely bored with the content. I am a classic Rock and Blues fan, but I like variety. I find the content on Sirius so repetitious that I can't even stand it anymore. I also find myself loading up my USB thumb drive more and more with music and listening to that as an MP3 player in my pickup more and more all the time. I also find myself listening more to Blue Collar Comedy and Laugh USA more than the music channels now on Sirius now than ever due to becoming so sick and tired of the content, but I am getting bored with that as well ( waaayyyyy to repetitive as well). I have often thought about cancelling my subscription, but I am on the road all over the place, where I don't always get FM reception. I am on the road every day and all day in my truck. I find I also like to follow my local FM channels to stay in touch with what's going on the real world.

That's where I would love to see all the FM radio companies come up with their own Satellite system. I would rather subscribe and pay for my favorite FM channels than subscribe to crap. I would gladly pay to have FM on my satellite system. It should be like Shaw Direct or Bell satellite but in our vehicles as radio satellite systems. That way we could subscribe to our favorite channels instead of a bunch of junk that we don't even want to hear and pay for what we only subscribe to. This would also be a great way for FM staions to generate more money and stay alive out there. Sirius could also make money by allowing this to happen with FM radio stations. I would still stay a Sirius customer if they would make it so we could subscribe to certain FM stations on our Satellite radios. That way we would never lose our reception to our favorite FM channels.

This may be wish full thinking, But I think it's a great idea that many of us would like to see and gladly pay for. I hope someone out there is listening or reading things like this and actually takes this idea and runs with it someday. Because whoever does this first already has their first subscriber waiting right here right now.

 

[JamesK]

You'll have the same problems with poor variety on most radio stations. For some reason, they seem to think you want to hear the same stuff all the time. It's not like it was, many years ago, when the "DJs" made their own selections. Like you, I've also started listening to MP3. At the moment I'm listing to the collection on my smart phone. At the moment, it's James Galway, in the past few minutes, it's been Art Garfinkle, Carly Simon, Enya and Elton John. These days, if you want variety, you have to make up your own, rather than listen to what the "program directors" decide will be forced on you.

With over 800 songs on my phone, I can go a long time before it becomes repetitive.

 

[ScaryBob]

Terrestrial FM stations are typically much worse than Sirius XM. Play lists are purchased by corporate head offices in predefined packages. Then the songs are repeated over and over until a new package is purchased (AKA a format change.) While I agree that some Sirius XM stations have relatively short play lists, some formats, by definition, have short playlists. Anything that is era based or plays a format that is no longer current has a limited number of songs to choose from. While I think that some of Sirius XM stations could do a lot better, corporate owned FM (which describes most stations) is much worse.

A better option are streaming radio services that allow the creation of playlists customized to personal taste. The subscriber gets to define what they want to hear and what they don't. I subscribed to several of these services at different times. They typically have a choice of several million songs to choose from. The down side is that some popular artists and songs are often missing. In addition, some of the better services are geo-blocked outside the US.

 

[mjjl]

Perhaps uplinking some of the college/university/community stations to satellite would be good. But most are available on the Internet anyways.

Some are also available on Rogers Cable. In London we can get not only Fanshawe's 106.9 XFM and Western's CHRW, but Rogers also carries CKMS at Waterloo, CJIQ at Conestoga College (supposedly a popular station in the K-W area), and K-W's CKWR community station.

 

[Dwayne Gorniak]

Unfortunately, down streaming and up linking requires the internet and is usually a luxury of the home or a mobile internet stick which relies on cell phone networks that would still create issues of loss of radio stations in certain areas. Not to mention the fact that that would be extremely expensive on a wireless data plan and would totally defeat the purpose. That is why Satellite is the only way to go in a vehicle. And the addition of FM stations to a satellite network where we could pick and choose our own stations and packages would be a much better experience for us consumers. We all have our own favorite channels. Why not be allowed to subscribe to them instead of the crap we don't want to hear?

 

[Blackburst]

I've had Sirius since 2006. And yes, there is a sense some material being repetitive. But nothing like regular FM radio stations. I think what works for me with Sirius is the ability to jump around to various music formats as I feel like. There are times that I might listen to a certain channel for months. When I get tired, I switch to another music format. And back around the block I go enjoying the various formats.

May I suggest the following for you. If you're driving around in a truck, you probably are driving into the US or at the very least close to the US border. Look into getting a portable AM/FM radio with a HD Radio tuner (home and car kits are available). One that I've been looking at is the Visteon HD Jump. This does require a proper install into your truck antenna system. There are various sub-channels of different music formats offered by FM stations all for free on their HD2 and HD3 sub-channels.

For now, no Canadian stations are broadcasting in HD Radio. So, if you're trucking thru the US this might be a option.

Here is a link to the Visteon model I've been looking at. The manual is available at the bottom of the page.

http://shop.npr.org/radios/visteon-hd-jump-radio-w/car-kit/

And if you want to know what HD Radio stations there are in your travels... look at this...

http://www.hdradio.com/

Hope this helps you out.

 

[BGY11]

Unfortunately that won't really help the OP, since he'd still be limited by the limited range of terrestrial signals. You'd get a few more stations than regular FM radio, but it would get tiresome fast if he has to keep changing stations as he goes out of range.

 

[ScaryBob]

Some stations are doing good things with FM subchannels. It looks like the format is DOA in Canada though. It is doing well in a few large cities in the US and Europe but that's it.

 

[mrvanwinkles]

That is unfortunate to hear about Satelite Music services.

If they are going to broadcast to such a wide, mobile audience, then I don't understand why, with today's availability of technology, they would limit their playlists and become repetitive. They should certainly be able to have a very large library of music available to them. Yes?

Given the wide coverage and potential size of the audience - they could do much better and be much more professional.

(if they are going to provide this service, and occupy the satelite music airwaves, then they should be able to do much better. Maybe they need to hire and consult with some professional DJ's for advice. Have live professional experienced people, with a track record, working on expanding content - and playing the right stuff.)

It must have something to do with economics and profitability (profits) of their service.

I too find myself scanning all sorts of "broadcasts" for better or different music content - or other content.

Heck - I even scan the AM dial, mobile or home - and find better content there sometimes - from furthur away. (Oldies Music, or better Talk Show content). Ottawa lost a couple of AM oldies music stations recently to News/Sports format (1200AM and 1310 AM lost in Ottawa) so sometimes I am tuning in, long distance, to stations out of Toronto Area - Oshawa, Toronto, Oakville (1580AM CKDO Oshawa and 740AM Zoomer Radio, T.O./Oakville, best of the best). And early morning / evening late night AM talk shows from the U.S.

Analog FM via Cable (Cogeco Kingston) - I realize not mobile though. Gives some content from out of region / outside Kingston.

Digital Music via Digital Cable Box (ex. Rogers in Ottawa) (again, not mobile)
- rebroadcast of radio stations from across Canada in the 900's channel range. Lots of room there to "ADD" good content.
- Galaxie Music Channels - 720's and up channel range - pretty good.
- Better Music Video Channels - ch 703 MM Much Music Retro + a few others nearby (Much Loud, BET TV ?, and not sure, used to even have a good Dance and Electronica, New Wave, video channels - all types of weird and interesting stuff - not sure if still there - have not seen them recently)

Internet Radio (streaming) - I have explored a little, and there is definitely some good stuff coming from far away - ex. Europe ex. Classical

Idea:

Find the best conventional "all band" radio you can for your vehicle. Maybe it could have an HD radio tuner / satelite radio tuner included/incorporated.

Also - some audio or digital inputs to connect other sources for recorded music. ex. MP3 player w/large memory capacity. CD Changer

Try to get a radio that has excellent "Scanning" capabilities and lots of "Memory Pages" - that you can call up and add tags, names or titles to the stations in memory, arrange or re-arrange them into different locations or pages - ie editing and labelling capabilities. As you travel your route(s), soon you will have quite a list of favourite stations built up in memory ... and can easily switch around and scan them for content.

Get a great mobile antenna installed for best reception.

Given that media players (MP3 players?) are starting to have very big memory capacities, and the cost is going down and down ... it is getting to the point that one should almost be able to carry around quite a LARGE personal library of recorded music now-a-days. (ex ? WD Live Media Player - Western Digital Live Media player - I think has a 1TB or 2TB Terabyte (!) hard drive - but that product might not be designed for mobile use / not robust enough / not able to handle the conditions / temperature changes or vibrations / shocks / in a vehicle - but someone out there must make such a produce for mobile use.)

Someone must make a large capacity MP3 player with solid state memory (no moving parts) designed for harsh conditions in a vehicle.

Once you have all that setup ... you should be able to switch back and forth from all these sources - to find content.

Complex ... but possible solutions.

Might take some investment of time and money.

But if you're always mobile - in a vehicle - might be worth it to explore some of these.

But if you get a really good radio and other equipment - watch out for theft.
Security then becomes very important.

Maybe they have units that "Pull out of the Dash" - then you can take it with you out of the vehicle, for security and for personal use elsewhere.

CONTENT - value $$$ and quantity and quality thereof - I am finding that to be the issue elsewhere / everywhere too .

 

[JamesK]

^^^^
Many smartphones have lots of capacity, limited only by the size of the microSD card. My Nexus One has only 4 GB, yet I have well over 800 songs in it, along with everything else. I also have a Nokia N800, which has a pair of 8 GB SD cards in it. Both devices support Bluetooth. I often listed with headphones, but also use the Nexus One dock, which is connected to a receiver on my desk.

 

[majortom]

I wouldn't pay a dime to listen to radio...no matter the source.
Just not that important to me.

If the medium is satellite, in more ways than one, it's no longer FM radio.