Satellite Radio Kit

[manglada]

I have just purchased a 06 GS 300 and am wondering if you are able to purchase the XM radio kit by other than the dealership. The least expensive dealer quoted 605 for kit and installation. Is this a good deal?

[TurboGS300]

See banner at top of this forum page <_<

[GuyTelefunken]

For ease of installation and integration to your factory system, bite the bullet and pay the price. What a few hundred compared to the price you paid for the car.

[joey8675]

I have just purchased a 06 GS 300 and am wondering if you are able to purchase the XM radio kit by other than the dealership.  The least expensive dealer quoted 605 for kit and installation.  Is this a good deal?

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I was charged 799 (negotiated down from 899) for XM or Sirius

[costanza]

Installation is VERY easy.... just time consuming with pulling out most of the inner trunk trim. I got an XM kit from lexus-parts(dot)com for $300/shipped. I didn't keep it though because I HATED the interface. My $50 Roady shows more characters (letter/numbers) and I can glance at my Roady and see at once: preset buttons, channel by number AND name AND the artist or song. With the Lexus interface, the preset buttons take up most of the screen and you can't see the artist/song while also looking at the preset buttons. You have to press TEXT, but then you can't see you're presets anymore :cries:

It also takes a couple seconds for the song info and channel name to pop up on the Lexus. With the Roady they are shown INSTANTLY! It makes it really easy to scan the channels :D

The only pluses the Lexus unit has over the Roady is ever-so-slightly better high frequency sound and it's a cleaner/stealthy install.

[GuyTelefunken]

How did you connect the audio from your Roady to the Lexus system?

[TurboGS300]

How did you connect the audio from your Roady to the Lexus system?

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I'm guessing he did the fm modulator <_<

[costanza]

How did you connect the audio from your Roady to the Lexus system?

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I'm guessing he did the fm modulator <_<

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I'm using the cassette adapter. The Roady is just sitting in the ashtray hole as I haven't gotten around to making a mount for it.

[GuyTelefunken]

Personally, I find the audio quality of both FM modulators and cassette adapters intolerable. I've tried them all in various cars. The only way to listen is direct line in. Doing this in a pre-2006 GS is a project, but it is possible. The difference in background noise, alternator whine, etc. is amazing. Of course, I recommend the OEM kit whenever possible, regardless of cost. At the very least a direct line input or aux input adapter should be used. Unfortunately, a reliable one for previous GSxxx generations does not yet exist to my knowledge.

I feel it's great to finally be able to get an OEM solution to the old problem of adding satellite radio to a Lexus. The factory audio system is good if not very good for most people so it's only fitting to feed it the best quality audio signal.

Here's the link constanza mentioned.

[costanza]

Personally, I find the audio quality of both FM modulators and cassette adapters intolerable. I've tried them all in various cars. The only way to listen is direct line in.

I bought an $90 P.I.E. adapter for my '04 Sequoia that turned the CD changer input of the factory radio into a direct line input for audio devices like a Roady. A direct comparison of the expensive PIE adapter vs. the cassette adapter showed NO difference in audio quality (I consider myself an audiofile). I returned the expensive adapter :)

As stated before, the Roady via cassette adapter has a SLIGHT reduction in high frequency repsonse compared to the Lexus OEM unit in my GS300. Definitly not enough of a difference to warrant the much more expensive price and VERY POOR user interface of the OEM unit :(

[GuyTelefunken]

I suppose it's a matter of opinion. Since you consider yourself an audiophile, I will give you some detail on what I have found. For the 1998 GS300 there is no aux in adapter or XM/Sirius input device currently available. Therefore, like you, I bought a cassette adapter. While listening to XM via this device I noted 3 things:

1. Flat, dull audio quality

2. No highs over 10KHz worth mentioning

3. Alternator whine at engine RPMs over 3K

This led me to think, perhaps the Chinese-made adapter was poorly made and I should try another brand. I did so but it was no better. Sidenote, if your satellite receiver does not have an adjustable line output, using a cassette adapter can be tricky. It's very easy to overdrive the tape head which is sensitive to millivolts with the 1 volt or more line level output of the satellite receiver.

The audio cassette preamp in your radio (all cassettes have this design) has a different EQ curve than a normal line input which would be flat. The reason for this is that cassette tapes have a bias signal recorded along with the audio signal. If you send a standard, non bias audio signal into the tape head, it does not translate well sonically in the preamp.

The solution I found to work best in my situation was to tap into the balanced line level input going from the head unit to the Lexus amp. This would be the line that sends the AM/FM radio signal to the amp. As my receiver does not have a balanced line output, I had to cheat and forgo the noise reduction benefits of balanced line operation. Considering this, the audio is clean and has the full frequency response one would expect to get. I checked it with my handy audio spectrum analyzer to compare it to the cassette adapter.

You see, I consider myself an audiophile as well.

[costanza]

I suppose it's a matter of opinion. Since you consider yourself an audiophile, I will give you some detail on what I have found. For the 1998 GS300 there is no aux in adapter or XM/Sirius input device currently available. Therefore, like you, I bought a cassette adapter. While listening to XM via this device I noted 3 things:

1. Flat, dull audio quality

2. No highs over 10KHz worth mentioning

3. Alternator whine at engine RPMs over 3K

This led me to think, perhaps the Chinese-made adapter was poorly made and I should try another brand. I did so but it was no better. Sidenote, if your satellite receiver does not have an adjustable line output, using a cassette adapter can be tricky. It's very easy to overdrive the tape head which is sensitive to millivolts with the 1 volt or more line level output of the satellite receiver.

The audio cassette preamp in your radio (all cassettes have this design) has a different  EQ curve than a normal line input which would be flat. The reason for this is that cassette tapes have a bias signal recorded along with the audio signal. If you send a standard, non bias audio signal into the tape head, it does not translate well sonically in the preamp.

The solution I found to work best in my situation was to tap into the balanced line level input going from the head unit to the Lexus amp. This would be the line that sends the AM/FM radio signal to the amp. As my receiver does not have a balanced line output, I had to cheat and forgo the noise reduction benefits of balanced line operation. Considering this, the audio is clean and has the full frequency response one would expect to get. I checked it with my handy audio spectrum analyzer to compare it to the cassette adapter.

You see, I consider myself an audiophile as well.

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Which XM receiver where you using a cassette adapter with? The Roady has an adjustable output level.

Also, you could "create" a line-level input into our factory radio by wiring directly to the tape player circuitry as described here if you have the knowledge to adapt it to our radio.

Here are pics!

[GuyTelefunken]

Certainly one could insert the aux. audio signal into the tape audio path. I thought about doing that as well. The problem with that is the silence detection circuit. To be able to enable the tape input on the Lexus radio you need to have a tape in the slot. Whenever a track changes, flips sides (or other silent passage is detected) a mute signal is sent over the data bus to the amp. This would cause an annoying muting of the satellite signal every time silence is detected on the tape. It may be possible to find an endless loop tape, such as those used in answering machines ten millions years ago. This may overcome the muting issue. Still, if you left it blank, the amp would remain muted even as the looped tape played. If you didn't leave it blank, you would hear both the tape and the satellite at the same time. You could interrupt the signal from the playback head to the tape preamp, but it's getting too involved now.

Using the audio line from the headunit to the amp is tricky enough. For some reason, pioneer decided to not just switch inputs at the amp but to allow any signal present on the audio line from the headunit to mix with the feed from the CD changer to the amp. So if you select the CD input, the radio signal is not switched off at the amp rather it is muted at the headunit. The way around this is to power off the satellite receiver when selecting the CD changer. Otherwise you hear both the satellite and CD at the same time.

As both the tape and radio audio signals travel from the headunit to the amp over the same balanced pair, I felt that my plug-n-play solution using both male and female toyota radio harnesses did the trick easier than opening up the headunit. Both radio and tape playback are now not possible, but I never listen to either of them anyway. Interestingly, the tuner also triggers the muting circuit whenever a station is changed. If any station, even a blank one is selected and not changed, the amp remains unmuted.

When it comes time to trade the car in, all I have to do is pull the headunit and unplug my insertion harness.

I'm using the Audivox XRFM001 unit which is quite antiquated as compared to what's available today. I chose it because the green LED backlit display is only a shade away from the Lexus stock color. It's small and doesn't look too out of place. The XRFM001 actually came with an external power supply/FM modulator unit wired to it. The quality of this modulator was the worst I tested. Simply using the RCA's that go from the remotely mounted receiver to my harness worked out well.

[crbama]

I agree that the cassette adapter works better than the FM Mod. I have a xm2go. The problem is my cassette begins to "click" after awhile. Anyone know how to fix that? Also, every once in a while the cassette wants to pop out on its own. Is there still no aftermarket AUX input that would work. I read about the Blizsafe that you could hook up to the CD changer but then I read the CD changer wouldn't work anymore. Any one know any different?

Thanks! :)