Official Slacker Forums

[madcap]

Another former XM sub, I used to swear by it. I knew the merger would be a bad thing from the beginning. The XM music got Siriusly screwed. The sound quality is horrible, the constant DJs drive me nuts, not to mention the narrow playlists.

I got my slacker and creted custom Ethel, Lucy and Fred stations, Im soooo happy with my Slacker!

[X-XMFAn]

A couple more XM defectors here. We used to love XM radio . My wife and I have been subscribers since early 2003, we had three subscriptions. Then In November the love was over, Sirius seriously screwed up our beloved radio. My wife just gave up and turned her radio off. We only used XM for music since neither of us listens to talk radio, sports etc. Our favorite station was Fred. I found Slacker through a post on a car forum. We listened on the web for a few days and were hooked. Two weeks ago I cancelled one of my XM subs and bought a G1 just to try it out for use in the car and while working. So far we are both very happy with Slacker. We'll be buying at least another G1 or G2 and the final two XM subscriptions will be cancelled next month when they're up. So long XM!! Maybe when you go out of business another company will buy you at fire sale prices and bring back the old XM. Now we're very happy with Slacker, it's much better than XM ever was.

[Eatsleepdrivesc]

Anyone know of a Slacker station that is like Xm Cafe 45?

[MikeV]

Anyone know of a Slacker station that is like Xm Cafe 45?

I tried to duplicate it, at least in its "Starbucks XM Cafe" form, in my custom At the Coffeehouse station... the link is below in my signature. :)

A possible alternative for the regular XM Cafe station might be the Adult Alternative station, in the Alternative category of Slacker stations.

[Eatsleepdrivesc]

Anyone know of a Slacker station that is like Xm Cafe 45?

I tried to duplicate it, at least in its "Starbucks XM Cafe" form, in my custom At the Coffeehouse station... the link is below in my signature. :)

A possible alternative for the regular XM Cafe station might be the Adult Alternative station, in the Alternative category of Slacker stations.

Thanks Mike. I will use your station.

Btw, This is Pontiacg6gtp from Xm411, and the D.C. Trip. Nice to see some familiar faces on here!

[TJStaar]

Hi everyone,

Another (about to be) former XM subscriber here. I've had XM since 2005 when I bought my car and loved it until this merger mess. 3 radios have become 1 and as soon as I figure out the G2 that I got this weekend that one will be gone too (before the price increase!). I'm awaiting the FM transmitter that I ordered to use it in the car and have been messing around with the web player.

Slacker looks great, and it's cool that there is a great forum like this for us newbies to the service. Thanks!

Todd

[KISSman]

I'm another former XM subscriber-turned-Slacker here. I was a subscriber since 2003, but it's just not worth it to me anymore. I don't like what Sirius did to XM and the broken promise of not offering XM subscribers an a la carte package/radio was the final straw for me.

When it came to music, I really only listened to a handful of stations -- Boneyard, Liquid Metal, Audio Visions/Spa, 40s, Cinemagic and The System/Area. All of them have replacements on here and/or something I can tweak and make my own. The only thing I really miss are the talk stations that I used to listen to. At least some of that can be streamed over the internet.

In a strange way, part of my enjoyment of Slacker and buying a G2 is my own personal way of flipping the bird to Sirius.

[Hank666]

Welcome to Slacker XMers!

[BillD3818]

Welcome to Slacker..Even though they do offer an Ala Carte radio:

and the broken promise of not offering XM subscribers an a la carte package/radio was the final straw for me.

[Big Daddy]

Another defector here. I've been an XM subscriber for a few years and have loved it. I went with the Best of Sirius package, not bad. I discovered Slacker when SXM announced their price changes (tired of being Nickle and Dimed).

I've owned the Slacker G1 8GB for a few weeks now. I love the Music and Comedy - it is like XM before the merger (even better). I do love Talk radio (O&A, Stern ...etc.), so now I sync up iTunes Podcasts to the Slacker (not exactly the same, but it will do)

I will keep XM for my wife's car - until the Slacker G3 is released anyway

[daren]

Anyone know of a Slacker station that is like Xm Cafe 45?

I tried to duplicate it, at least in its "Starbucks XM Cafe" form, in my custom At the Coffeehouse station... the link is below in my signature. :)

I would recommend it. As would most on this forum if i remember... (thread about posting the main stations you listen too)

[Sage]

XM's gone in my house and car....Slackers the guy and is loved by all here.

[hman33]

just got my G2 8Gb player about a week ago. now i canceled my xm sub today, after 2 1/2 years. i really like the diversity of artists and songs on the slacker stations. hopefully i won't look back at xm!

[KISSman]

Welcome to Slacker..Even though they do offer an Ala Carte radio:

and the broken promise of not offering XM subscribers an a la carte package/radio was the final straw for me.

Actually, they offer Sirius subscribers Sirius service a la carte -- not XM. To my knowledge, they did not make a radio for XM to handle a la carte service (the Starmate 5 radio is for Sirius programming only). I know that since they merged many of the music stations that it probably doesn't sound like much difference at this point, but the services are still different. I'm not going to wax politics, but one of my favorite channels is a political talk station on XM and the equivalent station on Sirius is not close to comparable. Being that this is one of the reasons I ever got it in the first place, this is a big deal to me. I'll just be streaming over the internet for that now.

[BillD3818]

Welcome to Slacker..Even though they do offer an Ala Carte radio:

and the broken promise of not offering XM subscribers an a la carte package/radio was the final straw for me.

Actually, they offer Sirius subscribers Sirius service a la carte -- not XM. To my knowledge, they did not make a radio for XM to handle a la carte service (the Starmate 5 radio is for Sirius programming only). I know that since they merged many of the music stations that it probably doesn't sound like much difference at this point, but the services are still different. I'm not going to wax politics, but one of my favorite channels is a political talk station on XM and the equivalent station on Sirius is not close to comparable. Being that this is one of the reasons I ever got it in the first place, this is a big deal to me. I'll just be streaming over the internet for that now.

I know this Ala Carte business is confusing. It is for me anyway.

But the Starmate 5 picks up channels from BOTH services.

The S5 should pick up channels from either service/birds. From my understanding the S5 is truly an all in one Ala Carte receiver.

[KISSman]

Actually, they offer Sirius subscribers Sirius service a la carte -- not XM. To my knowledge, they did not make a radio for XM to handle a la carte service (the Starmate 5 radio is for Sirius programming only). I know that since they merged many of the music stations that it probably doesn't sound like much difference at this point, but the services are still different. I'm not going to wax politics, but one of my favorite channels is a political talk station on XM and the equivalent station on Sirius is not close to comparable. Being that this is one of the reasons I ever got it in the first place, this is a big deal to me. I'll just be streaming over the internet for that now.

I know this Ala Carte business is confusing. It is for me anyway.

But the Starmate 5 picks up channels from BOTH services.

The S5 should pick up channels from either service/birds. From my understanding the S5 is truly an all in one Ala Carte receiver.

It's been a few months since I re-looked into this, but if you go here and checkout the a la carte plan, it only offers Sirius channels: http://www.sirius.com/packages/alacarte

No America Left/America Right and no Talk Radio (165) which is another favorite of mine.

I had read that Sirius/XM were considering making a specific XM radio for a la carte programming right after the Starmate 5 was released, but they had not come to any definitive plan to do so. This was also stated before they decided to merge all music stations together so I can see why they would be less inclinded to do it now. Unfortunately, by merging the stations, they pretty much mangled the programming on some of them so that alone made the move to Slacker still just as necessary.

Music-wise, Slacker is already far superior and will NEVER miss XM on that front.

[BillD3818]

From what I understand the S5 suppose to have a chip in it that's dual band and able to pick up BOTH the XM and Sirius signal. So it wouldn't matter which birds a station is being beamed from. That's MY understanding. Some of those stations on that list you linked are XM channels, like MLB channel 210. So if they're picking up stations off of XM's satellites then XM specific and/or Sirius specific shouldn't matter.

It's a dual band radio so it should pick up all stations no matter what bird they are being beamed from.

That's my understanding. I could be wrong, this whole Ala Carte business has been confusing from the start.

[Burner]

From what I understand the S5 suppose to have a chip in it that's dual band and able to pick up BOTH the XM and Sirius signal. So it wouldn't matter which birds a station is being beamed from. That's MY understanding. Some of those stations on that list you linked are XM channels, like MLB channel 210. So if they're picking up stations off of XM's satellites then XM specific and/or Sirius specific shouldn't matter.

It's a dual band radio so it should pick up all stations no matter what bird they are being beamed from.

That's my understanding. I could be wrong, this whole Ala Carte business has been confusing from the start.

I don't know if the radio is dual band or not. I do know that XM now offers the best of Sirius (Stern, NFL, etc), and Sirius offers the best of XM (MLB, Opie and Anthony, etc). These shows are being broadcast on both Sirius and XM sats, so you can get SOME programming of the service you are not subscribed to even on a very old radio built prior to the merger. There is an extra fee for this service, and I believe that this was the band-aid put in place until they either get enough radios that can receive both services out to the public, or they merge the services into one.

[BillD3818]

From what I understand the S5 suppose to have a chip in it that's dual band and able to pick up BOTH the XM and Sirius signal. So it wouldn't matter which birds a station is being beamed from. That's MY understanding. Some of those stations on that list you linked are XM channels, like MLB channel 210. So if they're picking up stations off of XM's satellites then XM specific and/or Sirius specific shouldn't matter.

It's a dual band radio so it should pick up all stations no matter what bird they are being beamed from.

That's my understanding. I could be wrong, this whole Ala Carte business has been confusing from the start.

I don't know if the radio is dual band or not. I do know that XM now offers the best of Sirius (Stern, NFL, etc), and Sirius offers the best of XM (MLB, Opie and Anthony, etc). These shows are being broadcast on both Sirius and XM sats, so you can get SOME programming of the service you are not subscribed to even on a very old radio built prior to the merger. There is an extra fee for this service, and I believe that this was the band-aid put in place until they either get enough radios that can receive both services out to the public, or they merge the services into one.

Yeah, that's what I meant about this Ala Carte business is confusing.

XM offers a so called 'Ala Carte' for all their radios, that's what you mentioned. The best of Sirius and 'packages' that XM picks what channels are in these packages. But IMO that's not truly Ala Carte.

But this Starmate suppose to let the user pick what 50 music channels, or 100 music and talk channels the USER/CUSTOMER wants, not what Sirius or XM offers in their pre-picked so called 'Ala Carte packages'.

Again that's the way I understand it. But I could be wrong.

[KISSman]

From what I understand the S5 suppose to have a chip in it that's dual band and able to pick up BOTH the XM and Sirius signal. So it wouldn't matter which birds a station is being beamed from. That's MY understanding. Some of those stations on that list you linked are XM channels, like MLB channel 210. So if they're picking up stations off of XM's satellites then XM specific and/or Sirius specific shouldn't matter.

It's a dual band radio so it should pick up all stations no matter what bird they are being beamed from.

That's my understanding. I could be wrong, this whole Ala Carte business has been confusing from the start.

I'm think the MLB channel is part of the Best of XM package. I'm not sure why they don't just put every station in the mix of both services if the Starmate 5 could really do this. If you go to XM's site, you can't subscribe to a 50 station a la carte package -- only on Sirius.

I was more angry about this fact when it originally meant that I would lose stations like Liquid Metal & The Boneyard if I switched to Sirius and got their a la cate package, but obviously you can get them today. Unfortunately, IMO, they aren't as good now since the Sirius took them over.

Anyhow, there is currently no way to get every XM station via the Starmate 5 and IMO, that's Sirius not following through with their a la carte promise to XM subscribers. The Sirius a la carte package isn't worth it to me if I can get all my favorite XM channels.