Crankin

Has anyone tried this in an S class or similar? What would be involved, and would it interface with the COMAND in a 2000 S class?
Thanks

Lynn

Plug the XM into the COMAND's aux input.

awiner

The 2000 COMAND doesn't have an AUX port in the S-Class.

Crankin

That sucks. Is there another way to hook it up to the 2000 COMAND? Does my COMAND have an auxiliary, but just no jack in the glovebox?

kaneman

I've had XM radios installed in every car the family has (including two S classes, our E and C class etc) and they're all the FM modulated units. Not much fidelity is given up to the FM modulation and it allows the stereo to be left completely stock and unmolested. It's also much easier to use than the Aux input for the cars that have them.

ctemkin

I can't offer information specific to an S class, but I just had xm installed in my e500. The shop, Myer-Emco in Gaithersburg MD, put in an alpine unit which connected via an rf modulator. The sound quality is excellent; I don't know if it would have been even better if an installation using an AUX were possible, which it wasn't, but I doubt much audio quality was lost. The unit you use for tuning is pretty small. Unfortunately, it was not quite small enough to fit in my ashtray, but it might in yours.

Crankin

Do these unit allow you to operate them via COMAND and what does FM modulated mean?
Thanks

ctemkin

FM modulated means that the add-on unit broadcasts an FM signal directly into the car's FM antenna. The radio treats it as if it were an regular FM station: you can set one of the presets to that "channel"; you can regulate volume by the radio's volume control, etc. The various XM units which work this way give you a number of alternative frequencies on which they broadcast, so you can pick one which has the least interference from actual stations in your area. If you want to listen to an actual FM station, you just turn the XM unit off, so that it doesn't interfere with the actual broadcast.

Crankin

Thanks, I'm going to look into it further. It sounds like a great thing to have.