I love my XM Satellite Radio. I got it for Father's Day three or four years ago, and I can't imagine not having it. I only listen to a few stations regularly - but I have those stations wherever I go and I love that. For its size, Atlanta has a shortage of good Sports Talk radio, which is what I listen to primarily. With my XM I can tune into ESPN anytime I like, as well as classical or anything else when the mood strikes me.
As far as music goes though, I find XM extremely limited. It may seem ridiculous to say that about a service that has over 130 channels, but it's true. There is the old joke about cable tv - 100 channels and nothing good on - that applies to XM as well. Within about a year I had a become familiar with the play lists on most of the stations, at least those I would listen to in the first place. When you factor in personal taste, there are maybe 30 music stations on XM that I would want to listen to. I guess I've gotten old because Pop music sounds like total crap to me now. The Classic Rock offering on XM is very limited, and the Alternative stations are about the same. Call me naive, but I didn't expect XM to have playlists - I figured sooner or later I'd hear a bit of everything. Not so much.
Then I discovered Pandora. I know, I'm a bit late to the party on this one - but don't the coolest people always arrive last? Pandora is a super concept - listen to music, give it a thumb's up, thumb's down, or no rating and the magic behind the curtain will learn from your likes and dislikes. Pandora will continue to funnel you new music that you may also like based on your feedback. The amazing thing is, it works - really, really well. Pandora suggested to me what may be my new favorite band: the Black Keys. They've been around for maybe a decade, but I hadn't heard of them. There are numerous other songs and bands that I would've never heard that Pandora has introduced me to, and I love listening to my custom station when I get the chance. It is called McDeadagain Eclectic for anyone who might care to have a listen.
So I had a great internet app for music and xm in my car for Sports Talk radio, but this was a bit limiting. Sometimes I wanted to listen to Pandora in the car and other times I wanted ESPN while working. Furthermore, I was maintaining a second subscription to XM for my wife's car which I only used maybe once or twice a month.
Now that I have a reliable phone (the Droid Razr) on the most reliable network (say what you want about Verizon Wireless, their 4G LTE network is fantastic) I have a solution that will allow me to listen to what I want, where I want, anytime AND save me around $100 a year.
First I cancelled both of my radio subscriptions with XM and signed up for an internet-only subscription. The customer service rep gave me a year's subscription for $91 - that's just about $7.50 a month and includes more stations then my traditional subscription did. Your mileage may vary, but the rep I worked with was extremely accommodating.
Next I installed the Pandora and SiriusXM applications from the Android Market onto my Razr. Harder to find was a good car dock application. In another case of a company making a very, very dumb decision, Motorola apparently left a means to access the standard car dock mode directly off the Razr, electing instead to make this launch automatically WITH the Motorola brand Razr car dock. This is a very poor decision on their part. I did find a free app that would launch the standard car dock mode, but it is extremely inflexible. It only allows for one application shortcut to be added, otherwise you get what they give you. How un-android!
Luckily there are a lot of car-dock apps available in the android market. After some research I've decided to pilot Car Dock Home v3 for awhile. It's not pretty, but it's extremely flexible and simple to configure - which is good enough for me. I'll always take function over form. This app launches a blank layout and allows me to customize seven home screens with up to six large icons each. Now I have Bluetooth, navigation, Xm, Pandora, and phone dialer apps all right on my home screen along with an option to exit car mode. The orientation rotates automatically with the phone. Too bad the stock car mode doesn't work this well.
Now with my phone all set up and ready I just needed a way to listen to it in my car. That's right, I don't have Bluetooth in my car! I drive a ten year old Oldsmobile Alero - it's a classic. Luckily I had a friend point me towards a Bluetooth FM modulator. After a quick search on amazon.com I found a gizmo that seems a bit too good to be true. The Gogroove FlexSMART X2 is a pretty cool gadget. You plug it into your cigarette lighter and pair it to your phone via Bluetooth. It will auto-search for the clearest FM channel, then you tune your car stereo to that channel. It has play and fwd buttons that will work with Pandora (and also reverse in case you are playing mp3s). It has a built-in hands free function for calls and according to the reviews the sound is great both for music and calls. I'll know for myself soon - it will arrive today. If this wasn't enough, it also comes with three cables you might need and includes a usb charging port (suprisingly, many of these devices have usb for data, but not charging).
It's also worth mentioning I found a great universal car mount. It cost only $15 and works great, I just about any phone made should fit well in this.
So I went from paying for two XM radio subscriptions and having limited access to the media that I want, to paying about 70% less to have everything I want in the palm of my hand. I love technology!
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