Who's Liistening to Pandora (or others) on SYNC via Bluetooth?

[MagicMtnDan]

Since Sirius shut itself off and aren't offering any reasonable pricing to subscribe I'm looking at other options.

For those of you using Pandora or others via bluetooth what's your listening experience been like? Quality of the service? Cost? Benefits? Negatives?

 

[bstoner59]

Pandora...heard Slacker is better. The quality isn't that good...especially on the phone via Bluetooth in my truck.

 

[HarleyGuy]

I've used both and Pandora is much better (at least over Android). I actually stream more podcasts over bluetooth than actual Pandora since I have Sirius.

 

[frogslinger]

well pandora is free so no cost...

sound quality is limited by the crap or speakers not the phone. I do have problems with a little chop now and again. I also do not like that my android automatically starts playing my mp3s as soon as bluetooth audio is selected,

 

[BigJ]

Pandora is a staple at work. But I've found it to be just ok in the truck. The issue I've run into is that it seems to throttle the music's bitrate depending on your connection quality. Not an issue if you stay in a 3G area the whole time. Big issue if you bounce between Edge and 3G a lot.

Also think about using the headphone jack on your device and the aux port on your head unit. Bluetooth works really well for spoken word, but I've found it to be a little sub par for music and it will lag significantly behind video; a bummer if your passenger is watching a movie on your device.

 

[MagicMtnDan]

So you're streaming video and audio to your touchscreen display from your smartphone or are you streaming the audio only?

In regard to FrogS's comments, I too don't appreciate SYNC playing mp3's on my iPhone automatically. It's another reason why I have an iPod connected to the USB port and play my music on that device (also saves my iPhone's battery).

 

[BigJ]

No sorry Dan, I should have been more clear; we don't have nav. Once in a while Joy will watch a movie on her iPhone (or laptop) and in the past we'll stream the audio over BT to the truck. The problem there was the lag from hearing the audio to what she was seeing on the screen could be a second or two.

 

[vegasfergie]

I love Pandora. I think the audio is good throught SYNC/bt connection. The problem I have is with Double Twist on my Droid. It tries to take over the Pandora app and I get double songs playing. Especially if I use the steering wheel control to scroll through songs. This is a phone issue of course, not the SYNC. But overall I think the quality of the bluetooth stream is good. Hooking my iPod up using the USB is better quality though, and you get more info on the display. Also, I haven't tried voice commands via BT. And I agree with Dan thay Sirrius is starting to really suck. Then want to charge for way too much stuff now, and thier content blows. I'm about to dumb them. The only reason I have to keep them now is for NFL channel and season starting.

 

[vegasfergie]

I love Pandora. I think the audio is good throught SYNC/bt connection. The problem I have is with Double Twist on my Droid. It tries to take over the Pandora app and I get double songs playing. Especially if I use the steering wheel control to scroll through songs. This is a phone issue of course, not the SYNC. But overall I think the quality of the bluetooth stream is good. Hooking my iPod up using the USB is better quality though, and you get more info on the display. Also, I haven't tried voice commands via BT. And I agree with Dan thay Sirrius is starting to really suck. Then want to charge for way too much stuff now, and thier content blows. I'm about to dumb them. The only reason I have to keep them now is for NFL channel and season starting.

 

[Nacho]

Pandora on my Android phone wont stream since i'm in germany. But i have it on my Mac since I use a proxy to listen to it. Last.FM works here tho, good but not great like pandora is. Havent tried slacker radio yet.

I really wish these europeans would get their act together and launch a Sirus satellite. I see that button on my dash and i get a tear in my eye lol. I just use my 320 GB HDD most of the time.