New Sirius Dual Streaming Plan Announced

[Dueport]

Sirius announced a new plan today called the Premium VIP Plan which is $35/m and covers two cars and two simultaneous streams. That last part should address the issue (raised in other threads) of not being able to have two different Sirius streams in C4 playing simultaneously right?   So now could be configured so if one person listening to Sirius in one room and someone else goes to listen to a different Sirius channel then C4 would start a second stream for the new person?

[Cyknight]

3 hours ago, Dueport said:

Sirius announced a new plan today called the Premium VIP Plan which is $35/m and covers two cars and two simultaneous streams. That last part should address the issue (raised in other threads) of not being able to have two different Sirius streams in C4 playing simultaneously right?   So now could be configured so if one person listening to Sirius in one room and someone else goes to listen to a different Sirius channel then C4 would start a second stream for the new person?

Interesting, that'll cut back on my cost for sure, been meaning to call them.

That said, it doesn't quite work that way. I have two accounts/devices/streams and to use both you need to add more than one driver to the system. That works fine, but you do have to select the 'other' driver to make it work (as me and my wife are the main ones using the service, we just tend to select our 'own' one). Slight advantage there is different favourite lists.

 

Assuming it still uses two separate logins for each streaming service, it shouldn't matter on C4's end that it's a single 'payment'.

[ekohn00]

Not sure how anyone can take that cost serious......   I still pay $5/month for Radio & Stream 

 

[Cinegration]

1 hour ago, ekohn00 said:

Not sure how anyone can take that cost serious......   I still pay $5/month for Radio & Stream 

 

The first year is that. After year one it’s $25 a month

[eggzlot]

29 minutes ago, Cinegration said:

The first year is that. After year one it’s $25 a month

Unless you call and ask to cancel.  They are know to be gracious with retention offers

[dinom]

I just call and say I want the same or similar price to what I had the first year and they have agreed every time.  I think I pay $72 per year with one time payment, and this includes radio and internet streaming. 

[ekohn00]

1 hour ago, dinom said:

I just call and say I want the same or similar price to what I had the first year and they have agreed every time.  I think I pay $72 per year with one time payment, and this includes radio and internet streaming. 

I've advised friends and others to just call ANYTIME, even when under a more expensive plan,  and everyone has been able to ask for the $5/m. It is unfortunate that you need to call back years as it always renews at full price, but the last couple of years, i've been able to renew via a chat session vs a call.

[Dueport]

1 hour ago, dinom said:

I just call and say I want the same or similar price to what I had the first year and they have agreed every time.  I think I pay $72 per year with one time payment, and this includes radio and internet streaming. 

Exactly what I do too 

[eggzlot]

And if you have the US (not sure about Canada) Amex Platinum card you get $20/month in a credit towards SiriusXM, Peacock, Audible and/or NYTimes.  Given I do not have a use for Peacock, Audible or NYTimes, I just need to make sure I keep my Sirius account ~$20ish a month (2 cars plus streaming) and its free. 

[Dueport]

13 hours ago, Cyknight said:

Interesting, that'll cut back on my cost for sure, been meaning to call them.

That said, it doesn't quite work that way. I have two accounts/devices/streams and to use both you need to add more than one driver to the system. That works fine, but you do have to select the 'other' driver to make it work (as me and my wife are the main ones using the service, we just tend to select our 'own' one). Slight advantage there is different favourite lists.

 

Assuming it still uses two separate logins for each streaming service, it shouldn't matter on C4's end that it's a single 'payment'.

Thank you for that clarification - so with a streaming service (like Sirius) you need separate instances?  

Doesn't C4 automatically select unused outputs when calls are made for audio?  Or maybe that's with respect to the outputs from the controller vs the audio source?  So say you have an EA5 with 5 audio outputs and multiple services (amazon, sirius, and Tidal), those services are not tried to a specific output on the controller but are routed through the outputs dynamically as they're called upon?  Is that accurate?  My apologies, I know I read a great description of this automatic selection on another thread but I haven't been able to locate that anywhere again....

If the above understanding is accurate it would be a great upgrade for C4 to go one step further and support streaming plans (family, VIP, whatever) that allow the account to play multiple streams at the same time).  So repeating the above example if two calls were made for Sirius, C4 would have opened the first stream to a dynamically assigned audio output on the controller, and then, when the second stream is called up, open the second stream to a new dynamically assigned audio output on the controller.  Maybe this can't be done due to the APIs made available from the services.....but it would be a very nice update.  Use case being: I don't know someone else is listening to one thing on Sirius (just for example) elsewhere in the house and then I select a different thing on Sirius in the room I'm in and I switch the Sirius station they're listening two when it kicks on in the room I'm in.

[Dueport]

11 minutes ago, eggzlot said:

And if you have the US (not sure about Canada) Amex Platinum card you get $20/month in a credit towards SiriusXM, Peacock, Audible and/or NYTimes.  Given I do not have a use for Peacock, Audible or NYTimes, I just need to make sure I keep my Sirius account ~$20ish a month (2 cars plus streaming) and its free. 

wow I didn't know about that perk - thank you!

[msgreenf]

1 minute ago, Dueport said:

wow I didn't know about that perk - thank you!

brand new perk announced this month and you must enroll 

[eggzlot]

18 minutes ago, Dueport said:

wow I didn't know about that perk - thank you!

as mentioned by @msgreenfyou need to log in to your account and enroll in the perk:

https://global.americanexpress.com/card-benefits/detail/digital-entertainment/platinum

[Cyknight]

1 hour ago, Dueport said:

so with a streaming service (like Sirius) you need separate instances?  

Doesn't C4 automatically select unused outputs when calls are made for audio?

This is specific to SiriusXM (maybe others as well that I'm not aware of/familiar with) because they only allow one stream per registered account (email) - so having one driver (one email) won't allow you to pick a second stream off of the account instead cancelling out the other one (try it at home with two phones at the same time) thus in C4 you effectively override the first selection.

Services that allow multiple streams, the system handles as you'd expect.

[Dueport]

13 minutes ago, Cyknight said:

This is specific to SiriusXM (maybe others as well that I'm not aware of/familiar with) because they only allow one stream per registered account (email) - so having one driver (one email) won't allow you to pick a second stream off of the account instead cancelling out the other one (try it at home with two phones at the same time) thus in C4 you effectively override the first selection.

Services that allow multiple streams, the system handles as you'd expect.

I see - thank you for that explanation.  I wonder if the Sirius driver would need to be changed to allow multiple streams or if just adding an account with this new plan would do the trick....

[Cyknight]

3 hours ago, Dueport said:

I see - thank you for that explanation.  I wonder if the Sirius driver would need to be changed to allow multiple streams or if just adding an account with this new plan would do the trick....

Like I mentioned, I expect that the new subscription still uses two emails in other words a new 'account' though I'd have to check to be sure. If not, I expect it would require a driver update.

[Dueport]

12 hours ago, Cyknight said:

Like I mentioned, I expect that the new subscription still uses two emails in other words a new 'account' though I'd have to check to be sure. If not, I expect it would require a driver update.

Thank you - might test this at some point and will report back 

[eggzlot]

On 7/27/2021 at 11:49 AM, ekohn00 said:

I've advised friends and others to just call ANYTIME, even when under a more expensive plan,  and everyone has been able to ask for the $5/m. It is unfortunate that you need to call back years as it always renews at full price, but the last couple of years, i've been able to renew via a chat session vs a call.

thanks for the push - just finished with chat support.  got my 2 cars down to 4.99 + taxes/fees (each) so about $13/month for both cars after taxes/fees.  comes with streaming log in too (per car account so I guess two streaming plans but haven't tested that out yet).  

[ekohn00]

1 hour ago, eggzlot said:

thanks for the push - just finished with chat support.  got my 2 cars down to 4.99 + taxes/fees (each) so about $13/month for both cars after taxes/fees.  comes with streaming log in too (per car account so I guess two streaming plans but haven't tested that out yet).  

Congrats....it's exactly what we've had. Once you login, you'll end up creating a username/pass for each stream.  I think we have the kitchen with one user, and the other rooms with another user.....    so far it's been working out.    I also stream in the car since the quality is far better than the Sat Radio, and you get the xtra channels.

Now if C4 would update the driver to use and favorite the XTRA channels, life would be just a but more musical.

[Cyknight]

4 hours ago, ekohn00 said:

 

Now if C4 would update the driver to use and favorite the XTRA channels, life would be just a but more musical.

xtra isn't available outside the sirius app at all - missing in API

[ekohn00]

14 hours ago, Cyknight said:

xtra isn't available outside the sirius app at all - missing in API

Just another line to the love-hate relationship with SiriusXM

[turls]

On 7/29/2021 at 4:29 PM, Cyknight said:

xtra isn't available outside the sirius app at all - missing in API

So they moved my second favorite channel--Cinemagic--from satellite, to only in the app, to now Xtra (just recently).  So no hope of ever getting this in native C4?  Or can C4 request it since obviously they are an official partner somehow?

[Cyknight]

20 hours ago, turls said:

So they moved my second favorite channel--Cinemagic--from satellite, to only in the app, to now Xtra (just recently).  So no hope of ever getting this in native C4?  Or can C4 request it since obviously they are an official partner somehow?

It's an out-standing request by numerous companies, Sonos, Control4 etc.

But as it stands, SXM is using these 'XTRA' channels as a means to draw people to their own app.