Aftermarket radio + VX antenna?

[MustangO4]

Thanks, now I have a project for this morning. As for the side conversation, I put in SIRIUS and love it. It is the way to go for music. I just like the local talk on AM for the politics, news and traffic.
"Play anything man, just play it loud!"

[kpaske]

A few comments about Satellite radio...

As much as I love music and variety and dislike repetative programming and all that, I don't think satellite radio is all it's cracked up to be. The first problem, and most annoying for me, is that it doesn't work when you're driving through heavily wooded areas. During my daily commute, I might get satellite reception 15% of the time. So I thought it might be good for long trips. I drove 15 hours, each way, to California and back over the holidays, so I had plenty of time to sample everything Sirius had to offer. 184 channels and nothing to listen to. I don't listen to Sports either (there are more of us than you think, Bart!) and I don't listen to very much talk radio unless its NPR or news or something semi-intelligent. So that leaves me with tons of great music, non-stop on the other half of the channels, right? Well, maybe, but I can still never seem to find anything to listen to. The other major downfall with Satellite radio is the fact that it takes too long to scan through stations. Because satellite communication is two-way (unlike radio, which is one-way), it takes a LOT longer to make a connection, authenticate, and get the signal streaming through your speakers. FM is almost instantaneous. Maybe some radios address this problem better than others, but the one I have in my VW is horrendous. And since I like to scan the stations rather than listen to a small number of presets, and it takes FOREVER to move from one station to the next, satellite just doesn't do it for me. I'd be curious to hear if others have had similar complaints with other satellite radios.

[Cobrajet]

I've had XM for a couple years and I too experience dropouts when in heavily wooded areas. This only occurs in a couple areas in my 85-mile daily commute, and only for a second or so. I drove from Northern Virginia to Atlanta over Christmas, and never lost the signal. My daughter did most of the tuning. She likes to pick the comedy channels, and different rock channels. I stick with a few channels that I have pre-set. I've never had a problem with a long lag while scanning. I never listen to FM in my VX any more, and there are no AM stations that I ever listen to.

I got XM because they had NASCAR, and I even bought a boom box so I could listen to the driver radios while watching the race on TV. Unfortunately, there is so much delay in the XM signal, that the radio feed was useless, and annoying. The boom box has been relegated to the garage for those times when I'm waxing the VX.

[Chopper]

interesting, a five year old post, that got like TWO return posts back in the day, has generated two pages of responses in the last few days. I don't know that the AM even works...but then,I've never squirted the windshield washers either. It has ,however, traveled about 200yards in low low

[Toad80t]

OK, the radio was really pissing me off so I ripped the dash apart tonight to check things out. I verified that the stock VX antenna is indeed powered (12v). The problem was that the Crutchfield wiring harness did not acknowledge the antenna pin and therefore didn't connect it to the antenna power. The stock antenna must be tuned to receive FM bands, as the FM stations sounded fine without power. The 12v must be to amplify the AM. So all of you with aftermarket head units that get crappy AM signals, check for the antenna power!!

Oh and as for listening to the tuner, I have Sirius and my iPod hooked up for music, the AM is for sports radio (since Sirius doesn't carry MLB). I don't ever listen to FM.

I just checked and my blue antenna power was not hooked up. ( No wonder I could not get am stations!? So, I cut the orange wire and spliced it to the blue wire. Volia, AM stations came it great. Well, as good as AM comes in anyway. Just thought I would share what I had dug up.

[Toad80t]

In my case, The blue wire from the deck harness was not connected to anything. The main harness (aftermarket) had no wire for it to connect to. I had to cut the orange wire and splice it to the blue one from the deck.