Sirius XM Radio SP-TK2 Satellite with Car Kit

My brother is a long-haul trucker and he's had one of these for about a year now. I just got mine in February.

The basic concept of satellite radio is that you have a receiver with an antenna which can pick up satellite radio transmission from pretty much anywhere in the continental US and/or Canada (I'm guessing Mexico too). There is no need to point your antenna like you would with a satellite dish, just mount it on the roof of your vehicle and plug it into your receiver and you have instant and reliable access to hundreds of channels/stations of broadcasting provided by Sirius for your listening pleasure. You can even put the antenna on a window sill or the railing of your deck, depending on where you live and how your house is shaped, and with a home-kit or boom box listen to satellite in your home or at the beach or virtually anywhere. For use in your car, the satellite receiver is also a transmitter which rebroadcasts onto an fm radio frequency which you then tune your car stereo into. You have the option to change this frequency to one that is free in your area.

Description of the Sportster Replay Car Kit

The satellite radio/receiver is 3.1 inches tall by 4.5 inches wide (and 1.1 inches thick). It weights 7.1 ounces and sits in a saddle which mounts onto the inside of your windshield using a powerful suction cup. There is a small lever which controls suction allowing the mounting position to be adjusted very easily (or the unit to be removed altogether). The radio simply plugs into the saddle so that you don't have to leave it in your car in open view or so that you can use it in an accessory such as the Sirius home base station or the Sirius Satellite Boombox. All wires plug into the saddle mount and these include the antenna which is magnetic and mounts on any metal part of the vehicles roof, as well as the power which plugs into a lighter socket within the vehicle. The kit also comes with a full function remote with battery included.

Detailed description of the Satellite Radio/Receiver Unit

The receiver portion on the unit features a 2.8 inch blue backlit 6 line LCD screen which by default displays the station name and number to which you are tuned, track information such as the artist, song title, and often even the album and year. Across the bottom of display is the station category, signal strength and the time. You can adjust the size and arrangement of what is displayed on the screen to show different track details or larger wording.

Below the large display, there are 10 channel preset buttons numbered 0-9. Between button 5 and 6 there is what is called the 'jump button' which allows you to switch between a previously programmed favorite channel and the previous channel you were just listening to (not exactly like a typical TV previous channel button which toggles between the last 2 channels you had tuned, but somewhat similar in the sense that it will remember the last channel you had tuned and then toggle between that and your pre-programmed favorite channel).

Across the top of the receiver is the power button which turns the unit on or off. (The radio remembers whether it was on or off as long as the radio remains in the cradle. Thus when you start your car if the radio was on when you shut it off, it will come back on without needing to press the power button again.) Next is the memo/s-seek button which is used to save and recall up to 20 artist names and song titles and can seek these out as they are played on any channel. Beside that is the band/p.tune button. Pressing and releasing this button switches between 3 preset banks allowing the preset buttons to reference up to 30 channels. Pressing and holding this button enters preset mode which allows for scrolling through all of your presets with the rotary knob. The menu button accesses the menus which allow you to make changes to options and configuration setup. Next to that is the display button which changes the display as I've described above.

On the top and middle right are two category buttons and a rotary knob. The category buttons navigate up or down through the list of station categories while the knob navigates through the individual stations listed for each category and/or the menu options and can be pressed to make selections for either menus or stations. Directly below the rotary knob are three buttons marked rewind, play/pause, and forward. These control the replay feature of this unit allowing you to begin buffering of up to 44 minutes of broadcast time and then replaying it, rewinding it or fast forwarding through it. It does reset when you change channels (gets flushed) which is a bit of a drawback, but it will record up to 44 minutes of the channel you are listening to and works great for talk radio channels while you make trips into the store or to get gas insuring you don't miss a thing (and if you've recorded enough minutes worth of programming you can fast forward through commercials).

Programming

Of course all the bells and whistles mean nothing without the programming which is the essence of why anyone would want satellite radio in the first place. Sirius offers roughly 130 different station/channels each with their own format, scheduling, DJ's and hosts. Each channel is able to concentrate on a fairly specific genre, subject or theme. Some are broader than others, but with nearly 60 music channels alone almost anyone can find a musical genre which will satisfy them much of the time and the rest of the time they can switch to another channel. There are about 35 news/talk channels which operate across the political spectrum as well as offer international news, financial news and news talk call-in formats. Some concentrate on current events. There are stations devoted to religious discussion, gay/and lesbian issues, Grand Ole Opry, Classic Radio Shows, and even a Korean language talk channel and a selection of family/children's programming. There are a number of comedy channels and various other entertainment, lifestyle and talk show channels which range from Raw Dog, Blue Collar Comedy to Howard Stern and Martha Stewart. There are also weather channels which are localized for every major metropolitan area in the US. Sports stations weigh down the other end of the scale to balance out the music choices. Sirius has extensive NFL, NHL and NBA coverage and sports talk of a specific and more general nature. Similar to the song seek features are game alerts which can be programmed to alert you to tune in to a sporting event at a predetermined start time.

A large part of the thrill of having satellite radio is simply in exploring all the different channels to see what's out there. Sirius is constantly adding stations/channels to the list and they will automatically show up in the list and come available from time to time. There have been about 30 new stations added since I purchased mine roughly seven months ago.

How does Sirius stack up against the competition?

Sirius isn't the only player in the satellite radio market. Their only viable competitor at present is XM Radio. While I don't know very much about the XM receiver, I am aware that many of the music stations have similar names and presumably then offer similar content. Howard Stern has signed with Sirius and Major League Baseball has signed with XM. I'm not really a Stern fan anymore (used to listen on terrestrial radio back in the early 90's) but I am a MLB fan and would love to have baseball games broadcast. Each has their exclusive artists and categories and I can't really say that one is preferable to the other unless you are looking for something specific like Howard Stern or MLB.

Contracts do expire; get rewritten, new ones get signed so perhaps stations which are on one now will jump ship to the other in the future. I don't currently consider the programming my main criteria and with all the choices would probably find stuff to listen to on either Sirius or XM.

Activation and Setup

Sirius Satellite requires a subscription to the service in order to receive programming much like satellite TV. This can be purchased and activated through a quick call to Sirius or performed online. You must provide some identifying information and the serial number of your receiver before they'll send out the signal which will set up your radio to decode (receive) all of the channels. Over the phone, they'll ask you if you'd like the Playboy channel at that time which is free, but requires you answer yes to their offering of it. Then they will stand by while your radio activates to insure that everything has run smoothly. I went through this process again when I got a new receiver as they had to move my subscription from the old s/n to the new one. It went quickly and smoothly both times. When I bought my package it was about 150.00 for a year. There were deals available for 2 or 3 years which would save you some percentage and there was lifetime activation available for 500 dollars. I'm not sure what is available now, but will explore the offerings again in February when my current subscription expires.

There is a difference between US and Canadian programming which mostly has to do with the news, talk radio, and local weather stations which are specific to the different countries. Any receiver will take either the US or Canadian activation, but you'll need a billing address in whichever country's programming you'd like to receive.

Internet Audio Stream

Another feature worth mentioning which comes free with your subscription is access to streaming Satellite Radio content on the internet. You'll receive a userid and password which will allow you to surf to the Sirius web site and stream content to your PC. Not every channel/station on Sirius has online content available for real time streaming, but many of the music stations do. I've spoken to Sirius and inquired about the stations which don't seem to offer it at this time and I was told that this is something which for many channels is offered by the content providers who are contracted by Sirius and thus it would be the individual content providers for those stations who would have to initiate putting their content online but if or when they do Sirius will provide access to it through their website.

Issues

The satellite radio and the other components of the car kit seem to be well built and presumably will last. The radio does get warm when in use, but is designed to sit in the windshield of your car and thus is built to operate in some pretty high temperatures. I did however have a problem with my unit a few months after purchase. My signal strength was very weak and I was often unable to acquire a signal at all. I also own the boom box which has its own antenna, and because that didn't seem to work either, I initially suspected that it was the receiver unit itself that wasn't working. I had purchased the kit at Radio Shack and was aware that it came with a one year warranty. The store was very good about immediately replacing my receiver with one taken from a new kit, no questions asked. When I returned rather sheepishly the next day having determined that it must be my antenna they were just as friendly saying that whatever I brought in from the car they would replace with new and RMA the rest back to the company. The new antenna worked great. (I swapped the cradle and wires as well just to rule out any connection problems which I had learned from the sales guy represent the bulk of the complaints with these). My brother actually keeps his antenna wrapped in plastic (it came in a little plastic bag (to protect it from the elements), but I haven't resorted to that yet although it may not be an altogether bad idea. Just before mine ran into trouble I had been switching it back and forth between my car and my wife's car all of the time and speculate that doing so may have impacted the connections or kinked the wires or something along those lines. So now it stays in my car and I've had no problems at all since May.

A quick note to those unfamiliar with Satellite Radio is that the antenna needs a clear 'line-of-sight' to the (a) satellite and when you drive through a tunnel or even under a particularly tree lined street in summer or between some tall buildings you may lose your signal while doing so. This is always temporary and you'll enjoy full signal strength again when you emerge from under the obstruction.

Wish List

I really don't have any specific complaints about Sirius programming or the features and operation of the receiver. There are channels I would like to have like Major League Baseball and I would like less commercials on some of the talk radio shows and I can think of a couple of music genres I'd like to see better represented, but programming is always expanding and improving so I'm satisfied with waiting to see what comes down the pipe in the future. I know that the receiver's features and functionality are evolving too although I'm quite happy with the features and ease of use I have for now with my Sportster Replay.

Conclusion

Satellite radio is a great concept, especially for those who live outside of large metro areas and just don't have access to the same selection of AM and FM radio broadcasting that is available in large cities. The cost is still quite reasonable at about 12.95 per month in most places and the installation and setup of the radio and service are easy enough to have the average listener up and running in a matter of minutes. There are accessories available which will allow you to bring the satellite radio experience into your home or anywhere you could go (such as the beach or while traveling) without having to have your vehicle with you.

So far in my experience the functionality and use of the unit itself are intuitive and feature rich and I'll definitely be renewing my subscription when it expires.