[kwkarth]

About a month ago I bought a car that came with XM radio. I got hooked on the infinite source of new music. On voice programs the compression is high and the bit rate is low, but on the Jazz and Classical stations, the sound is about as good a good FM radio.

I liked it so well that I picked up a Delphi MyFi and a pair of Senn PX100.
They sound pretty good together. Enjoyable at least.

The biggest letdown for me is that you cannot edit your recorded play list. It's either all or nothing. Once you record it, you're stuck with it until you erase the whole 5 hours of capacity.

Any hack for the firmware to allow editing of the playlist???

 

[erikzen]

I have no idea if there is a hack for the MyFi, but I saw it in an ad and I was intrigued. I've been interested in satellite radio for a while but never really wanted to take a chance on it. I was half waiting for a true portable solution, not this stuff where you have to plug it into a boom box.

So can you recommend the MyFi? Besides the 5 hour all or nothing deal, what are the shortcomings? Is it really, truly portable? Is it hard to keep the signal?

Any information is appreciated.

 

[kwkarth]

Hi erikzen,
Yes, the MyFi is truly portable. It comes with its own internal antenna and three external antennas to deal with more challenging reception situations.

Here in PDX the reception with the internal antenna is just fine when you're out doors. When you go inside, depending upon the construction of the building, the reception can be anything from fine to non existent. That's where the external antennas come in. There is one antenna intended to use at home. They suggest placing the home antenna on a south facing window sill. In my house, I get no cell telephone reception for 3 of the 4 carriers in the PDX area, yet using the "home" XM antenna, I don't even have to place it in the window for it to get perfect reception. I can just set it pretty much anywhere on my desk. I get spotty reception indoors with the internal antenna, but with any of the three external antennas, the reception is good in my house. The MyFi comess with two docking stations, one intended for desktop use and one intended for mobile use. I have the desktop docking station line out plugged into my home office stereo and home XM antenna. I'm using the mobile docking station and mobile antenna at my office at work. It's a big industrial complex, completely saturated by RFI at all frequencies and I just plopped the XM mobile antenna (magnetic base) on the side of one of the flipper cabinets in my cubicle and reception is perfect at work too! If I were a subway rider (we have no subway in PDX) that's where the 5 hours of buffered program material would come in handy. We do have a light rail commuter system here and part of the line is under ground for a mile or so, the 5 hr buffer would be perfect for that. I get 4-5 hours of continuous use from the LIon battery between charges.

 

[erikzen]

Thanks for the info! I found an interesting review on the radio here. The author of that article didn't seem to get reception as you mention. While it's tempting, I think I'll hold off for a while on this. I'll wait until the price comes down and the technology, both in the compression and reception, improve a bit. I've never been much of an "early adopter" anyway. I'm more of a "wait till they put it on sale adopter".