Is Michigan football on XM Radio
After checking the interwebs, it's unclear if Michigan football is on XM or Sirius. The XM site has the Big Ten logo on it for sports, but Sirius specifically mentions a few marquee schools, uncluding Michigan, USC, UCLA, etc. I'm going on a cross country road trip/move on labor day weekend and I want to make sure I can get the UConn game when I'm somewhere in the Arizona desert.
Any mgobloggers out there with XM? Do I have to get "best of Sirius?" I looked on the websites and no games are scheduled for "this week." Well, that helps.
Thanks in advance!
August 22nd, 2010 at 1:10 PM ^
I have XM in my car and yes you do get the radio broadcasts for the games.
August 22nd, 2010 at 1:14 PM ^
I can also confirm I have received Michigan games on XM. They currently have 3 Big 10 channels (196-198) plus several "overflow" channels that will generally have games, especially the 12PM kickoffs.
August 22nd, 2010 at 1:19 PM ^
I don't know about this year, but the answer in the past is: it depends.
For home games, Michigan had an exclusive agreement with Sirius. Even after the merger last year, I don't think we got the home games unless you had the "Best of Sirius" package, which costs even MORE money...
For away games, you could almost always get the game, but it was the broadcast team from the other school.
There's a place on the XM website where you can go to check the listings as the games get closer.
I have had mediocre to bad luck getting M football on XM. (Basketball is typically better...)
August 22nd, 2010 at 1:23 PM ^
These idiots need to just kill each and rebrand under one name... But anyway; so even if it's a financial dong punch, I could turn my XM and get the game with the "Best of Sirius?" It wouldn't kill me if I only needed to do it on a month to month basis.
August 22nd, 2010 at 2:01 PM ^
with rebranding has as much to do with technology as anything else. If you bought an XM radio before the merger you can't get Sirius feeds and vice versa. At some point they'll probably bite the bullet and offer to swap radios to one system or the other, but that takes case and SiriusXM isn't exactly flush -- a year or so ago, they were on the verge of bankruptcy.
August 23rd, 2010 at 9:50 AM ^
I agree. But I think the poster just below has it right: it is partly an equipment issue right now. The problem they have is that they can't afford to alienate the current installed base to get a new system up and running. They're using both old XM and old Sirius satellites right now.
Still, they are doing their best to extract the most amount of money possible and the "best of" packages are one way to do it. They also kinda screw your month-to-month idea by making it so that it is impractical to go with anything less than a one year subscription.
I think they somewhat botched the integration, but have worked out a lot of the kinks. I guess their models show it is more revenue if they maintain these packages with the "best of" options. To me, it would be simpler to make the lineup exactly the same and offer the same programming to everyone. I'm locked into XM (with the choice of best of Sirius) because of the hardware in my vehicles. Even if I want the base Sirius package, there's no way to get it.
August 22nd, 2010 at 9:42 PM ^
-1 corso quote.
+1 good info....
you play with fire my friend...
August 22nd, 2010 at 1:22 PM ^
but they do have a new 24hour fantasy sports channel if that is your thing. just launched a couple months ago. one of my groomsmen, a buddy from high school, runs the channel. truly a 'dream job' if i've ever heard of one. if you're into fantasy sports, you should check it out.
August 22nd, 2010 at 2:40 PM ^
I also have to travel during the Uconn game. I use a free Iphone app called ShoutCast Radio to listen to world news from foreign radio stations. There's literally hundreds of radio stations available so for the 4rth Ive favorited every Michigan radio station I can find in hopes of listening to the game live for free.
August 22nd, 2010 at 7:00 PM ^
I have a Sirius Satellite radio with the Best of XM.
I did receive the Michigan games last season, when needed.
(For example, when I ditched HS practice early,senior year, on September 12th because I had better things to do, aka catch the Notre Dame vs Michigan game. I had perfect reception/signal, all the way home.)
August 23rd, 2010 at 11:28 AM ^
To be safe you'll need the XM + Sirius package. As I recall, the Michigan away games were generally on XM. But Michigan home games were not -- on Sirius instead.