Problems with the FCC for SIRIUS, XM
The FCC is back in the news for reasons that, assuredly to his own chagrin, have absolutely nothing to do with Howard Stern. Apparently, the FM radio transmitters put out by both SIRIUS and XM Satellite Radio, which are key components to their basic hardware packages, violate FCC emissions standards by giving off too strong a signal.
In case you don’t know, the FM transmitter is what allows most satellite radio users to listen to their broadcasts. A special antenna conveys the satellite signal to the suscriber’s reciever, which then, via the FM transmitter, broadcasts a relatively weak FM radio signal that is picked up by the suscriber’s regular factory-installed car radio. The user thus listens to satellite radio stations through his or her regular car speakers, as if the standard land-based radio was on. Apparently, both SIRIUS- and XM-produced hardware exceeds the FCC limit for this tiny emission.
Although it sounds so, this may not be a case of typical FCC nitpicking. Your buddy whiskerino has heard of cars in bumper-to-bumper traffic that unavoidably pick up satellite tranmissions from neighboring vehicles. Both XM and SIRIUS try to keep the frequency in the under-used high-80’s range, but this is unfortunately the same range as many local and college radio stations. Imagine the look on that indie kid in the car next to you’s face when all he wants is to listen to unreleased Belle and Sebastian tracks and all he gets is the intoxicating bump-bump of your satellite Dance Music station. WYPR (88.1) in Baltimore has experienced an especially high volume of complaints regarding interference from satellite radio, during the Howard Stern Show in particular (which runs while traffic is at its most dense and cars are closest together for extended periods of time).
This obviously comes as bad-news for investors. XM shares recently hit a 52-week low, while in a pre-emptive move, Sirius halted production on several of its potentially-violating products–which is certainly not what its already troubled stockholders want to hear: SIRIUS share values have been dropping for going on two years now.
UPDATE: Apparently, SIRIUS is confident that it won’t have to make any major financially damaging recalls. The losses that it takes from the production halt are expected to be minor or even non-existent. The same basic thing happened with XM’s production halt a few months ago. But since both XM and SIRIUS have been putting out this type of hardware for a while now, one wonders what took the FCC so long to figure out there was (slash invent) a problem.
January 5th, 2007 at 12:31 am
Thanks for the info. Sirius told me their newer units had less FM transmitting power than the older ones, because of the FCC claiming that it was illegal for a Satellite radio to transmit to another vehicle (or something like that). In any case, my second radio (a Sportster) sucks, while the 1st (a Starmate) is excellent (almost no interference ever). Sirius is sending me the FM-out adapter kit for free.