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It is lost as soon as you walk under a tree, behind a telephone pole or God forbid a butterfly flys overhead. I live in a relatively flat rural area of Pennsylvania and purchased the SIRIUS Stiletto SL100 Portable Satellite Radio Receiver almost two years ago to use when working outside. It doesn't sound like the new Stiletto 2 is much better. It is primarily designed for the creative listener that likes to hear every 10th measure of a song or intermitent pieces of a game and mentally fill in the rest. It has been a major disappointment primarily because of the poor reception. The headphone antenna is mandatory to obtain any signal, but even with the headset I am only able to get intermitent reception.
My clock radio doesn't have input jacks so I mounted a car kit stand on top of it and used the transformer plug from the home kit to power it. I wear it walking and the signal is great unless the canopy of trees is very close on both sides. I had sirius built into my car stereo, and an old portable sportster I used in my other vehicle with a car kit. Outside It worked great on the beach in northern Wisconsin and in the virgin islands. The headphones are a pain, but I got used to it. I had 2 home docking stations in the house, but I could turn on any radio in the house or listen with a portable FM radio outside up to 50 yards away(cutting the lawn). The stiletto barely sends a signal 5 feet.
Unless you plan on installing an outside antenna and using the device for stationary listening, you're much better off with a standard MP3 player that includes an FM receiver. I'm not the type to generally review products, but the Sirius S10 was so remarkably bad, that I thought the least I could do was add my two cents here for other potential buyers. What the other reviewers say about the earphones and signal issues is absolutely correct---I cannot conceive what value a "portable" satellite receiver has that is virtually incapable of receiving any signal, and then when it does, loses it if you happen to move the wrong way.
The antenna headphones are pretty good at getting signal, much better than the antennas that come with the Sportster, but they are bulky and uncomfortable. For here, lets just say don't plan to use it in the car.
Getting satellite radio signal. So, to sum up, Sirius satellite radio.Excellent content in terms of music, talk and news.
I LOVE Sirius radio, and I paid well for this because I thought it was supposed to be a high-speed, low-drag way to get it. And the car kit is, well.See my review there.
A pain in the behind. It is not.
If you want to use it in the car, or as anything but a Walkman, you have to buy seperate kits (another $100 after the $195 I'd already paid).
you could (unfortunately) change your expectations just a bit, accept this radio for what it is actually able to consistently deliver on-- and ENJOY the heck out if. I am already used to using Tivo and not watching television "live" anymore-- so applying the same concept to satellite radio wasn't very difficult. (The home docks come with the outputs and cables that you will need to connect to other devices for dubbing). Yes, you could buy this radio and attempt to run around with it wearing the uncomfortable, oversized antenna headphones and spend your day repeatedly tilting your head at weird, painful angles trying in vain to hold onto an elusive live signal, thus frustrating yourself silly in the process. Good Luck. Plug in a REGULAR pair of headphones-- whatever kind you like-- and enjoy.In other words, just think of it as a radio version of a Tivo (or other brand of DVR).
Buy the MANDATORY home dock with the superior antenna, automatic charging of battery when the unit is docked, and remote control.2. Another benefit of recordings is that you can skip through the recorded songs (yes, song breaks are included in the recordings) very easily; quickly finding the songs that you may want to "dub" onto something else. (Buying a second 'home dock' for the office will give you even more flexibility). Program the radio to record up to 10 hours of your favorite channels, in 60-minute blocks (or whatever duration you prefer; I record a fresh 9 hours of content overnight while I am asleep, from about 6 different channels). Not hard to do.
or. I really wish I could say that you can be mobile all day with this radio picking up live signals with no problems from the antenna headphones, but the stark REALITY is that your "live" listening will possibly have to be relegated to when you are plugged into either a car or home dock; otherwise, you are just going to have to start enjoying making up to 10 hours of recordings (while docked) and then listening to them during your mobile times. Wake up to 10 hours (or whatever you have chosen to record) of fresh, remixed content. Here is how:1. You do this while the unit is sitting in the home dock, making use of the continuous power supply and greatly improved antenna reception.3.
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