Now that Sirius and XM have officially merged, what does that mean for me and my '08 ES with Sirius radio?

At some point should I be able to start picking up XM stations with my existing radio???

I've been paying for the Sirius subscription since my free trial ran out in December. However, I haven't really been thrilled with the product. I listen to music, not talk, and I have not been impressed at all with the musical diversity. I mainly listen to "First Wave" which is supposed to be early alternative rock. In my opinion, they should call this station "The New Order Channel" as about every time I listen for more than 20 minutes I can pretty much be sure to hear New Order. If I want to hear the same things over and over again I can use my MP3 player or listen to commercial radio! If I'm going to pay for radio, then I want some diversity and the chance of hearing something I haven't heard before.

About two years ago I put a portable XM radio in my wife's truck, and I've been much more impressed with the music on XM. Stations like XM Cafe seem to offer much more diversity than anything I've heard on Sirius.

Anyway, the main reason I've kept up my subscription with Sirius is that I've been hoping the merger will go through, and hoping that I will soon be able to pick up XM channels though the radio in my Lancer. The Sirius web site and various articles I've read in the news indicate that the new "Sirius-XM" will offer a mix of what both have been offering, but I haven't seen anything about when this will happen, or if a Sirius-compatible receiver in a car will be able to pick up XM stations.

Any info will be appreciated!

 

It's too early to tell, but likely not. Sirius uses a different band than XM and a dedicated sirius receiver can't pick up any other band, nor can a XM receiver pick up Sirius. The newly combined company will likely come out with new receivers in the not too distant future that will be able to pick stations from either service.

 

From what I can remember reading (admittedly awhile back) is that Sirius would become the majority owner and they'd combine they're stations with XM's, adding new ones and getting rid of redundant ones. If that's the case then I don't think anything would change for your receiver. I haven't read anything about the completed merger though, so I'm not sure if that's what will happen or not. All I know is that's what was speculated (I think in the WSJ).

 

That makes more sense then keeping both sets of channels. They are trying to save money by merging... But yeah if the channels merge your receiver will update your channel guide automatically.

 

sirius bought XM.. therefor they own xm's stations. Not al will be on sirius but they will have some.. main example the sports they will have baseball and so on. There were a lot of things they were made to do and stations they had to give up for this to work.. so there will be some additions but not really xm stations coming over more shows than music

 

one of the main things the gov wanted was that all recievers would still work for all the new channels. so your radio is fine