Sirius Starmate 5 stops by FCC, XM gets a mention

We'll cut straight to the chase: on the surface, there's nothing all that enthralling about the Sirius Starmate 5. In most every respect, it looks, smells and likely acts much like its predecessor. Granted, the color schemes have been updated a bit and you'll still find that delicious Sirius Replay support included, but the humdrum 5-line display, obligatory FM transmitter and bundled remote don't do much to get our saliva glands workin' overtime. As Orbitcast points out, however, there is one thing about the FCC filing that piques our interest more than anything else, and it's a simple phrase from a posted correspondence letter: "We used the satellite radio signal coming from either XM or Sirius." Whether or not this actually means anything is yet to be seen, but it makes for some decent fodder at the very least, yeah?

[Via Orbitcast]

[NumberXII @ Apr 26th 2008 11:39PM]

I need GTA IV.

[peacebyanymeans (AKA: Moorio) @ Apr 27th 2008 12:21AM]

Look, I want GTA4 too, but you don't see me going around and spamming it in post that have nothing to do with it.

[G @ Apr 27th 2008 12:26AM]

i already have it, it isnt all that. you can wait.

[Aguiluz @ Apr 27th 2008 12:50AM]

Greater Toronto Airport terminal 4 is this way:

http://maps.google.ca/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=toronto+airport&sll=43.599227,-79.667187&sspn=0.029214,0.080338&ie=UTF8&ll=43.678922,-79.610195&spn=0.05835,0.160675&t=h&z=13

[Derek @ Apr 26th 2008 11:40PM]

Will this be the first unit to support both XM and Sirius? I guess time shall tell...

[Rick @ Apr 27th 2008 5:34PM]

All XM/Sirius receivers since the 2nd generation on support each other's satellites. This was part of an agreement the FCC brokered in 2000 in order to insure that if one ever took over the other (or a bankruptcy took place) the players would continue working. So once the merger takes place, they can enable any receiver (except the really really old 1st gen units) to receive any satellite they want via a simple software upgrade.

[Libb @ Apr 28th 2008 4:26AM]

They may or may not support the competitor's satellites (not sure if you were BSing with that one, but since the bands are so close, I wouldn't be surprised if they could tune to both), but older devices will most certainly NOT be dual-band compatible. Why? Sirius and XM use VERY different codecs, and almost all receivers use hardware chips to decode the data streamed from the satellite into audio. Incompatible codecs = incompatible receivers.

And the only receivers that can receive firmware upgrades are the portables (on the XM side, the Inno, Nexus, and Helix, and on the Sirius side, the S50 and Stiletto family). Older XM units MIGHT be able to download codec updates OTA, but as far as I can tell, that was only used once way back a few months after launch to clean up some bugs in the decode chip - downloading a whole new codec would be a no go.

[Blacksheep @ Apr 27th 2008 12:41AM]

If they FCC ever gets off their ass, maybe the public can actually have a receiver that gets both XM and Sirius within the next 2 years!

[RG man @ Apr 27th 2008 2:08AM]

dude who cares about sirius radio?

[kyle allen @ Apr 27th 2008 2:23AM]

is this new fangled "HD" radio any good? im thinkin of gettin one 4 ma car, unless its total crap. input?

[shibathedog @ Apr 27th 2008 3:48AM]

Yeah its pretty decent, and its free. The quality is a lot better but its not CD quality. Usually what you get is a 2 HD radio stations for each FM channel, HD1 will be the same thing as the FM channel but in "HD" and HD2 will be the channels alternate station, example: one hip-hop station around here plays old school hip-hop on the HD2 channel. Another big plus is some of the AM stations actually have HD versions so they aren't so painful to listen to.

Doesn't stop the radio from being terrible around here though, I miss the great radio in Detroit/NYC.

[CUBSWILLWIN @ Apr 27th 2008 10:07AM]

Listen to 890 AM. Once you listen you're hooked. Not amusic station but great for fun talk shows and great for weather and news. Lots of things like money talk also.

On a side note, if Sirius can boot a reciever with XM and sirius support, I'd like to notify them I'm sold.

[Esat Dedezade @ Apr 27th 2008 10:22AM]

I'm glad to see the FCC have replaced their rusty rulers.