And HERE'S WHY you are going to pay for Sirius On Line

JoeTan

Well-Known Member
Oct 14, 2008
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Introducing:

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If you didn't have to pay for the internet service this would be a "free" sirius player. Looks like they are very much interested in moving at least some of their radios to WIFI.
 

TSS Taylor

DRC Fan
Oct 9, 2008
3,501
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Chicago, IL
www.tss-radio.com
I'm really interested in selling those. I saw them at CES.

But the thing is Bandwidth is expensive. If they had 5 million more subscribers with Satellite it doesn't cost them anymore, but 5 million more listening online and it costs them a lot more.

Plus I would be willing to guess a lot of people never use the online stream and end up giving their online login to their friend so that they can listen. I know I've done that before. Now that those people have had a taste of the service for free they can subscribe and contribute to the service they enjoy.

Right now it's all about getting financially stable. If you own or run a business it's obvious. If they can prove that they can pay off this debt and make money they will survive. If not, they won't and then those other services who are more competitive will just be able to raise their prices and attempt to make a business out of it as well.
 

almaniac27

Member
Nov 12, 2008
395
17
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Kent, Ohio
I have one of those radios, and they do more than just Sirius. It can get like 10,000 online radio stations from around the world. Musically you can find way more variety than on Sirius/XM. I barely miss the Punk channel or Fungus because I've found several great punk stations online. I've found all sorts of weird music stations on there, like one in the Netherlands called "Beyond the Beat Generation" that just plays vinyl records from weird 60s psychedelic bands like ? and the Mysterians and the Electric Prunes. For reggae fans, you can get actual reggae stations from Jamaica, which is freaking sweet. On top of all that, it also does Pandora. I still use my XM for Howard Stern and sports, but with music, it's mostly the Grace radio.
 

almaniac27

Member
Nov 12, 2008
395
17
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Kent, Ohio
Oh yeah, btw, these Internet Based Players are nothing new, The Logitech Squeezebox and the Sonos System have been around for a year.

They're still relatively new compared to satellite radio. Wifi radios are really popular in Europe but they haven't really caught on over here yet for some reason.
 

xan_user

Banned
Dec 16, 2008
3,234
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Nor-Cal
I have one of those radios, and they do more than just Sirius. It can get like 10,000 online radio stations from around the world. Musically you can find way more variety than on Sirius/XM. I barely miss the Punk channel or Fungus because I've found several great punk stations online. I've found all sorts of weird music stations on there, like one in the Netherlands called "Beyond the Beat Generation" that just plays vinyl records from weird 60s psychedelic bands like ? and the Mysterians and the Electric Prunes. For reggae fans, you can get actual reggae stations from Jamaica, which is freaking sweet. On top of all that, it also does Pandora. I still use my XM for Howard Stern and sports, but with music, it's mostly the Grace radio.



Sounds like just what I miss from sat rad.

What punk and Jamaican stations do you listen to most?

My friend has one and loves it, so much so hes dropping xm after 7 years when the price hike comes.
 

almaniac27

Member
Nov 12, 2008
395
17
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Kent, Ohio
My friend has one and loves it, so much so hes dropping xm after 7 years when the price hike comes.

Sounds like just what I miss from sat rad.

What punk and Jamaican stations do you listen to most?

There's a good reggae station based in Jamaica that I listen to called "RootsRockReggae". Unfortunately, they stream at only 32k, but there are plenty of good stations that stream at higher bitrates, like Rastamusic.com. There's even one called "101 RU Russian Reggae" :cool:

As for punk stations, my favorites right now are "Killed By Death" and "Punk4Punks".
 

limegrass69

Confused
Oct 12, 2008
6,079
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New York
I have the Sonos setup at home. It has always required that I upgrade to and maintain the premium 128K stream in order to access it through my Sonos.

Don't get me wrong, I would not bother sending the low bandwidth streams through my audio system. The upgrade for the higher bandwidth stream is well worth it to me.
 
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xan_user

Banned
Dec 16, 2008
3,234
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Nor-Cal
I have the Sonos setup at home. It has always required that I upgrade to and maintain the premium 128K stream in order to access it through my Sonos.

Don't get me wrong, I would not bother sending the low bandwidth streams through my audio system. The upgrade for the higher bandwidth stream is well worth it to me.


SONOS!:bigthumbup:
 

hexagram

Medicinal & Recreational.
Oct 11, 2008
2,760
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Seattle, WA
How much is that radio? It looks nice. I think I'll get one for my dad (and maybe one for myself as well).

[Please tell me that thing comes with an extra speaker]
 

Jgatie

Banned
Oct 14, 2008
1,402
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Another Sonos user here. It has transformed my music listening. The high bitrate stream is awesome. I have two internet accounts, both 128k. I use one to record Howard Stern every day via Replay A/V. The program logs into Sirius, records the stream, splits it on the hour, converts the file to MP3, tags the file, and loads it into iTunes.

My other 128k account is for Sonos. I listen to the first 2 hours of Howard with a Sonos alarm set to 6 AM in the bedroom zone. Then when I get home from work, I get the Sonos remote and listen to the 8-12 portion via the MP3's which were indexed into Sonos by a daily 1 PM reindexing. I listen to Sirius music, sometimes blasting throughout the townhouse, any time I want and it's all at my fingertips via the Sonos Controller or the iTouch remote.

It is kind of expensive, yes. But worth it (as is the premium streaming).
 

almaniac27

Member
Nov 12, 2008
395
17
18
Kent, Ohio
Please tell me that thing comes with some RCA line-out jacks so that I can hook it up to a decent amp!!!!! :confused:

No, it only has a headphone jack in the back. I hooked mine up to my stereo with a patch cord and it sounds pretty good. The radio is pretty affordable. The most I've seen it go for is $150. Grace, the company that makes it is working on a new line of products that should be available next month that have more features. Here's a linky: Grace Digital Launches Family of Internet Radio Media Streamers - Yahoo! News
 

lronglien

Member
Nov 10, 2008
190
6
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Squeezebox boom

I have the Boom and can get the Sirius music and some talk channels. Pretty cool. Where's the iPhone ap though??
 

Jgatie

Banned
Oct 14, 2008
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I have the Boom and can get the Sirius music and some talk channels. Pretty cool. Where's the iPhone ap though??

It's not by Logitech or Squeeze, it's a open source plugin. I'm not sure, but I think it's called iPeng.

Sonos has it's own in-house app that they fully support. It's pretty good. Actually, since it got me to purchase an iPod Touch, it's gotta be great. I formerly loathed touch screens, but I'm starting to think twice about them.
 

DAB

Mod Emeritus
Oct 9, 2008
9,434
149
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Louisiana
I was checking this out just last night. This thing looks cool and with the built in alarm and sleep mode so you can go to sleep and wake up listening to streaming SIR.

Sweet!
 

JoeTan

Well-Known Member
Oct 14, 2008
1,425
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So say I want to add one of these to my acct. Do I just upgrade my on line acct for the $2?

What if I wanted to add 3 of these to the house? Do they each need an internet connection at $2each or will one work?
 

digital100

Member
Oct 15, 2008
214
1
18
Northern Virginia
I have Sonos at my house. There is a big price difference. For a single zone with wifi, you will need a zoneplayer for $350 and a zonebridge for $100. This new Sirius unit is only $150.

I have two Sonos zones, and I can tell you that setting the second zone to a different Sirius channel than the first zone will shut off the zone 1 Sirius stream, and it shows a message that Sirius only allows a single stream from a user account. So I believe that if you purchase two of these new Sirius units, you will need an additional subscription.

Overall, I think this is a great move by Sirius. I am not near a repeater, so getting a Sirius signal into the house is a pain in the neck. And the premium Internet stream has a much higher sound quality. I hope this type of product increases the adoption of Sirius in the home.