Har-ray

Why does the sound quality coming thru Iphone via bluetooth sound twice as good as the sound quality thru SiriusXM?

Foosh

Since it's satellite based, Sirius XM has rather narrow bandwidth. Expanding bandwidth requires more satellites, which is obviously astronomically (no pun intended) expensive.

Even streaming via Bluetooth produces considerably more bandwidth. More bandwidth means richer, fuller sound.

Eff A Ford

XM sound quality is equivalent to a 96k bitrate MP3

A near CD quality MP3 file is around 256k bitrate.

So XM is less than half the quality of a digital audio signal.

We can get 1080P and they are starting to put out 4k resolution through satellite TV, I don't understand why we can't get high quality audio through satellite radio.

Woodson

I agree. XM/Sirius is unlistenable imo. I didn't use it when it was free.

berk4422

Stream XM on your phone and it sounds much much better. Been doing it for years and won't go back to a car XM receiver.

LT1 Z51

XM has gotten better in cars (I have a regular home antenna and I've compared it to streaming on my PC or Phone), but it does have way more compression that CD quality MP3's

What usually happens is you get bass that is more "blaah" as opposed to distinct beats, and some of the treble gets washed out.

While I like USB, Bluetooth, and the occasional FM, I still find XM enjoyable sound quality be damned because its commercial free and exposes me to new music.

Foosh

Your last reason is why I still subscribe. I've become addicted to the Coffee House for that very reason. It's all acoustic stuff and new, rather unknown artists.

Corgidog1

There are advantages to having a tin ear-such as having no issue with XM quality

Foosh

LOL, I do have a pretty good ear, and can easily discern the obvious difference with higher bandwidth. But, my musical taste is fairly narrow, and acoustic, "unplugged" stuff sounds "acceptable" on the Sirius/XM receiver through the C7 Bose Premium system.

I think there is a difference in the quality of sat receivers. It was unlistenable in my Jaguar F-Type, and I didn't even try.

DAFFYDRUNK

Seemed to me the more pop oriented stations sounded a little better...like they can allocate more bandwidth for the some XM channels. I didn't think it sounded too terrible for most stuff, but I still don't subscribe because it's just too much work for what I get out of it. You either get ripped off or you schedule your cancellations and renegotiate 2x a year ect... It's just not worth the hassle.

Citation

XM is highly compressed, but so is bluetooth. Connect your iPhone via a usb cable and you'll immediately notice an improvement in audio quality, versus the same iPhone music source via bluetooth. After that it also depends on the source within the iPhone. For example Spotify has different bit rate options which change the amount of data you use if played live, or storage space if the songs are stored. There is a noticeable difference in audio quality among those bit rates, especially if you connect with the USB.

I have to laugh when I see someone spend $2k on an audio system, and then use bluetooth as the input source.

Woodson

Agreed. I never use BT either.

USB using 192 or 256 bit rate for me.

Greg00Coupe

Me too!!! With that in mind so I run a USB from my I phone and use Pandora? Is that cool or is there another I phone app/service which is better quality? I dont mind the quick commercials with Pandora and like their music venues.

boxster99t

I guess folks without smartphones and Bluetooth in cars may subscribe to XM/Sirius or those that want their content. For music, "roll your own" or use your favorite streaming service (Spotify, Pandora, etc..)

The only good thing is that at least the c7 doesn't have that fugly sat radio shark fin/bump of an antenna. Don't know what the car manufacturers are paid to keep putting Sirius/XM in cars. Wish they wouldn't or do like the C7 and not have the external shark fin/bump on the car.

LT1 Z51

As a previous poster said, Spotify and Pandora unless you plug in your phone in (using USB) are not appreciably better sounding than SiriusXM. Because Bluetooth also uses compression. And again their quality is assuming that you have a high quality internet connection (as your connection degrades, compression increases).

I have a smartphone, but limited data, so therefore using Spotify and Pandora is not feasible. Paying for SiriusXM is cheaper than paying for the data I'd need to stream all the time.

Personally, and this is purely my opinion, most people have not used SiriusXM recently and still have this attitude of how the quality was in 2008 or earlier (which was noticeably worse), and therefore have attitudes and thoughts that are out of date. Somehow whatever is newer (Spotify or Pandora) is somehow automatically better.

Honestly in my opinion if it's not a CD, or a 256 kpbs MP3 or better it's not good sound quality. SiriusXM, Spotify, Pandora, and Bluetooth connections all qualify, and therefore to me they are all the same audio wise. To argue that one of those is better than the other shows a lack of understanding of the technology. Again, my opinion.

speed4tu

I will agree the XM signal is not spectacular but to me it sounds perfectly fine. I love Alt nation so therefore call in 2x's a year for the "deal" to keep it cheap. 50 bucks a year isn't too bad. I also have spotify premium also and stream that as well but mainly while riding my bike. Unlimited verizon data plan on my phone so i burn it up on extreme quality vs. downloading.

Just out of curosity does anyone have issues when plugged into apple carplay with spotify? When i launch it on the carplay screen on the car I always have to launch it on my phone the first time to get it to work correctly.

Har-ray

My Spotify does not show on carplay like Pandora and Slacker does. I read elsewhere that Spotify has to be started on the phone first. I will try that tomorrow.