Alternative to Sirius and Pandora?

[straightshooter1]

I have a brand new Honda Ridgeline that I love.

I have a "life" membership to Sirius which turned out to be 4 radios. In other words once you have gone thru 4 vehicles or 4 radios, you gotta pay again. I know I can negotiate the monthly/yearly cost with them, just not sure I want to.

I might though, maybe, possibly.

I have Pandora for free, but am frustrated as I cannot seem to buy (yeah, that's right-BUY) their Premium Service for 10 bucks a month. Only way to "talk" to them is via email, which they "may" choose to acknowledge, or, maybe not.

Are there any other alternatives to these services. I like the oldies, both Country and R&R, as well as Southern Gospel?

Bob

 

[billwill]

I've used Sirius for a number of years. Not the best but a heck of a lot better than listening to all the **** commercials on FM radio.

 

[Onomea]

I use Spotify. It is an internet streaming music service, but comes in over the iPhone when not connected to a WiFi router. So when I drive I can connect via blue tooth to my car's speakers.

At home a have a digital audio converter (DAC) — mine is called Audioengine B1 — plugged into my stereo and listen to it that way. I think it costs about $10 a month and it has all the music I have ever encountered.

 

[straightshooter1]

I was looking at Spotify. It seems to be the only real alternative to Pandora or Sirius, unless someone here has experience with some other one.

The other alternatives I found by searching the
web aren't real attractive.

I agree about Sirius being better than all the commercials, though I have a limited interest in music.

On Sirius it's the 50s, 60s, Willie's RoadHouse, Outlaw Country, Blue Grass and Enlighten (Southern Gospel). I never listen to any of the others.

Actually, most of my listening is just Willie's and the 50s.

 

[Kanewpadle]

Radio has gone the way of TV these days and I ain't paying for
satellite radio. So I burn my own Cd's.

 

[nachogrande]

LOW TECH

I still spin my 60-80's vinyl. Watch out for potholes though.

 

[S42N8]

Spotify and Tidal are the two major streaming services (behind Pandora and iTunes); Amazon Music is gaining based on its overall market share. I like Spotify because you can get decent downloads (at least Redbook CD; Pandora One and iTunes are compressed). Tidal has similar quality, but it skews heavily rap/pop/hip-hop/moderncontent. Amazon Music is much the same quality as iTunes, but if I buy an LP, CD or (some) Blu-Rays, AutoRip has it on AM within seconds. iTunes isn't into physical media.

 

[Onomea]

FYI, if you have an Amazon Prime membership, Amazon Music is included at no additional charge.

 

[Targets Guy]

I burn my old cd's and vinyl to the computer and load to itunes. My ipod syncs up with the Subaru's radio and I have lots of music

 

[chief38]

I've got three of my vehicles subscribed to XM/Sirius and have their service for about 13 years now. I'm not thrilled paying as much as I do but I do enjoy the programing they offer. I listen to the 40's channel most of the time and on long trips I love the Radio Classic shows from the 40's 50's and early 60's. Today I was listening to CH. 18 which is currently the Beatles Channel. On the Harley I listen to the 60's channel most of the time. Can't let the Guys know I'm listening to the 40's channel or I'll never hear the end of it - LOL

I usually call once a year to re-negotiate, but other than that I've got no complaints.

 

[doublesharp]

I take it you have used up your Sirius eligibility?

I bought my 2008 Ridgeline new and used the free 3 months then didn't renew. They offered me a $5 per month deal, 5 months for $25 and I took it. I must call before my promo period expires and renew. I just say the service is worth $5 per month to me. Either renew my promo package or cancel my service. They never cancel.

 

[bluetopper]

I pay for Sirius $30 for 6 months in my company pickup. To me it's well worth it as I'm in it all day every day as I'm a superintendent for a highway construction contractor. The pickup is my office. I listen to Fox Business, Fox News, Willie's Roadhouse, and a few others but from 11-2 I have to turn it on AM and listen to Rush.

 

[straightshooter1]

It looks like what I need to do (since my music interest is pretty limited) is negotiate Sirius to about $5 per month and then either try Spotify or try again to get Pandora to take my money or, failing the last, just keep using the free stuff from them.

Thank for all the help.

Bob

 

[kwselke]

I'm very pleased with the free version of Pandora and have been streaming my Asleep at the Wheel channel to my old analog stereo for a couple of hours this afternoon. I get an occasional commercial and it may time out if I do not interact with it occasionally. There is also a lot of music available on YouTube. My new Android phone came with (Google) Play Music installed and a free two month trial, but I have not tried it out yet.

 

[M1A]

I had XM for many years. Always more money. Dropped them.
I'm real happy with Spotify. My own playlists.

 

[ChattanoogaPhil]

I use my iPhone via Bluetooth to the car stereo.

I've accumulated a good sized music collection over the past few decades of about 10k songs. It's all loaded onto my iMac in iTunes.

I pay Apple $25 a year for iTunesMatch. What that does is allow me streaming access to all my music from Apple's servers. So without having to load any music onto my iPhone I have access to it all. I just tell Siri to play the album, song or one of my playlists and it'll stream to the iPhone and then to the car system via Bluetooth. Works really well. And because it's going through iPhone it works great with navigation or phone calls because the music automatically cuts off and then back on for a call or voice navigation instructions.

I also listen to talk radio via Apps for live streaming radio shows and sometimes Podcasts for recorded shows. Rarely listen to Pandora. Apple has AppleRadio that I think (not sure) I get commercial free because I have an iTunesMatch account but I never listen to it. I think it's part of Apple Music but I don't fool with it.

We had Sirius and enjoyed it. But once we got iPhones it didn't take long for us to decide to cancel Sirius. After we canceled they were offering us rates less than half of what we were paying... go figure . No thanks... not worth ten cents to us now.

There's so many options... pick one or two or ten...

 

[nachogrande]

ANSWER ME THIS

I burn my old cd's and vinyl to the computer and load to itunes. My ipod syncs up with the Subaru's radio and I have lots of music

I use my "older" Toshiba laptop cuz it still has a cd drawer, newer ones don't seem to. transferring vinyl to computer > a flash drive would be great. How do you do it?

 

[chaparrito]

I transfer vinyl to computer using a USB turntable and Audacity recording software. Auto saves it as mp3, then it goes into my iTunes library where I burn it to disk on my older MacBook pro for use in my Ridgeline or at home. Otherwise I just plug the phone into the auxiliary input and enjoy my own playlists. I just bought my '11 Ridge, it came with 3 months of Sirius, which is OK, but I don't drive that much that often and don't plan to renew.

 

[ChattanoogaPhil]

I copied all my CDs onto the iMac using Apple Lossless rather than crunching the files down in 256. Not sure I can hear the difference on my home stereo but I'd like to think I can.