Sirius Satellite Radio announces mobile weather plan

[Ben McMillan]

Just saw this on the web...


http://www.sirius.com/servlet/ContentServe...d=1110896708469


Looks like XM/ Baron may have some future competition...thoughts?

 

[Jason Boggs]

Sounds very good...now let's just hope the pricing is good as well.

 

[David Drummond]

Sounds very good...now let's just hope the pricing is good as well.

Yeah, let's hope a little competition drives the wxworx monthly pricing down! :wink:

 

[Mickey Ptak]

Sounds very good...now let's just hope the pricing is good as well.

Yeah, let's hope a little competition drives the wxworx monthly pricing down! :wink:

For me the start up cost is what deters me from buying it. I could live with the monthly fees as long as there is no contract, but $900 for the equipment and setup fees. BLA! They can keep it as far as I am concerned. I will just have to stick with the free wifi until I can convince my wife to stop spending money...

If Sirius can keep the price down I will jump on it, but I don't think that will be the case at all.

Mick

 

[Tim Johnson]

I feel the same way Mickey. 80 bucks a month is pretty steep, but probably doable for only a few months out of the year. But a contract roping you into continued payment, or start up fee seems like insult to injury. Shoot, the way gas prices are going up, I'm wondering if I will be able to afford many long distance chases this year.

 

[John Diel]

Same here. Start up costs are very prohibitive to most people. Then add the monthly charge of $80/month (is it that high??). If I were to spend the $80/mo. I would just go ahead and get Cingular's wireless internet plan. That way I would be able to get what I want and not what someone is canning.

Storm Hawk (Mike Smith out of Wichita and member of this forum) is a little more pallatable though still outside my range and is hampered in that it doesn't work with laptop computers which many of us have. Thos of you with a PDA or are looking to get one, may want to look into this.

(I have never met Mike, nor have any stake in Storm Hawk. I thought I might get that out before someone gets me for plugging a product)

 

[David Drummond]

wxworx is $100 if you get all the toys. I will determine at the end of the season if the costs balanced out, but I suspect as much as I chase it will. Roaming charges really hurt a couple months last year.

I actually suspect the more your out chasing, the more cost effective having wxworx is as opposed to those that don't try to chase every event. I do think if Sirius radio launches a competing project it will drive the pricing down. It happened when the original satellite radio services came out, it happed with DirecTV and DishNetwork.

I do also believe that for what you get the cost of the wxworx equipment is a bit high. But, it IS nearly realtime continous radar (and other products) in your chase vehicle all the time.

 

[Tim Johnson]

Then add the monthly charge of $80/month (is it that high??).

Actually, the ground plan is 99 bucks, the master marine plan is 50 I believe. While the idea of continuous radar sounds great, at these prices, I will just have to stick with cell phone, wifi and eyeballs. The cell phone is a util that I use aside from chasing so I don't count that as chase expense, just a bonus.

Oh well, maybe one of these days prices will become more attractive, or some other means will become available. Meanwhile, I'm still having a blast without xm.

 

[Karen Politte]

I'll be excited if it's true internet and not dumbed-down readybake weather data. But that's unlikely. :wink:

KR

 

[Jeff Snyder]

For what it's worth, with WxWorx, there are also two $29.99 plans -- the Fisherman and the Sailor packages. They both include radar imagery, surface analysis maps, NWS warnings, etc... You can check it out at http://www.wxworx.com/marine/service_pricing.php

I am just hoping that the Sirius weather package will have a lower equipment price... I agree with those above in saying that the initial equipment cost is preventing me from buying the system. $30/mo isn't bad at all (heck, my cell phone data plan is nearly that much), but the $900-$1200 equipment is much too expensive for me, a poor college student.

 

[David Drummond]

I'll be excited if it's true internet and not dumbed-down readybake weather data. But that's unlikely. :wink:

KR

Yeah, that's not likely. I think Jeff P. said that was part of why there isn't even MORE data that they would like to put into wxworx, was because there was just so much bandwidth they had to work with right now, and that was it.

I suspect Sirius would have some similar bandwidth restrictions. Honestly, I would expect to see a comparable product to wxworx.