I am new to the satellite radio. When I bought my A3, Sirius came with the car. I like that there are many stations, however, the sound quality is not even par with FM radio. Are all Satellite radios sound quality this bad? The volume is also low compare to the FM stations. I always have to turn it up 4 to 5 notches using Sirius. Is there a way to improve the sound quality? Thanks.

 

When my sirius was working I had great sound quality and great levels of volume. I know you can also pay like a dollar or two a month for CD quality from Sirius but I didn't think that was necessary as I was very happy with the quality. However the issue is that my modulator went bad almost FOUR months ago and Sirius has been on backorder so the dealership can't get the part. I'm pretty pissed about the whole thing. I miss my Sirius. Anyway, I might suggest you try upgrading to CD quality through Sirius.

 

I've had Sirius for about three years now. Sirius uses a dynamic bandwidth allocation technology on their network, basically it can change the amount of bandwidth of each channel depending on the content that's playing. Because of this, I've noticed that the same station may sound like crap one day and like a CD the next. How long did you have Sirius? If you didn't listen to it much I'd suggest giving it another chance. If it sounds awful try changing to a different channel and see if it's better. FYI, the talk and Tx/Wx channels always sound bad - they always have lower bandwidth because they aren't music.

The option on Sirius' site to pay extra for CD quality is only for web streaming- it does not affect the quality in your car. Streaming Sirius over the web is normally 32kbps WMA, the upgrade allows you 128kbps WMA. Not quite CD quality, but it is much better!

P.S. XM's sound quality is better than Sirius most of the time. I prefer Sirius' content over XM's, but maybe you could check out XM's free trial on their website. If you like their content you could find an XM receiver on eBay or maybe trade someone who wants Sirius.

 

I've had the car for about a month now and have been listening to it almost every day. I usually listen to the news channels because of the sound quality. Even when I am listening to the music channel, I have to adjust the volume to about level 14 to hear (but on FM channels, level 7). I'll try calling Sirus to see if they have any suggestions. I will also ask the dealer to check it out.