Jst joined this forum today and found a whole world of info that's been really useful so I figured I'd ask about something that has annoyed me since I picked up my E350 a few weeks ago.

Is there any way to get the "song info" to display on the COMMAND screen for Sirrius and stay there? Everytime I press "info", the song/artist info comes on. If I turn off the car or change to my iPod and come back, it's back to stations again. Drives me nuts.

I don't mean to offend, but I just came off an Audi A6 with their version;MMI and the intuitiveness of that system is years beyond what I've experienced so far with this car. The Audi would let you delete stations or categories you don't listen to and displayed the song title even before the "Lag" it takes to hear the song so you could scan really quickly. I don't know if this is a Benz thing or a Sirrius thing (I had XM before).

Kinda burns becuase the Benz is almost $10k more and isn't as "smart" as the Audi is. Really nice car, great drive, etc., but alot of gear that is standard on an Audi is not even available on this car-my bad of course, because I sort of "assumed" and yes I know what happens when you assume.

I don't know anything about Audi's so I don't know when that version of Audi you drove came out, but you have to realize the W211's came out in 2002 as 2003 MY. So the car is 5 years old, and technology changes rapidly in 5 years.

Yes there was a minor facelift in 07-08 MY's. I love the car though, enough to not care about the 5 year old technology.

If you want something w/ the latest technology, the latest generation MB's are amazing .. S-Class, CL-Class, C-Class.

I figured as much. Knowing my luck they'll change the whole car next year.

I think they are changing the car next year, the W212. Sorry.

I almost got Sirius fitted in my car...until I was told how much.
Radio = 595
Antenna = 110
Install kit = 110
+ Labour

It was going to be around $1000. And then $12.95 a month. I love Howard and all but, I couldn't justify this. Although I don't want to I am thinkin of the little dash recievers, or maybe the Stilleto 2 which is coming out in time for Xmas. The Stilleto won't work live in the car unless I have an antenna fitted. But I can record some shows while at work (have a boombox and get great recept while stored in a metal overhead cabinet), and then just listen on the way home.

You'd think for the MB price you would be able to leave on song display. I mean, the rinky-dinky dash units have all these features. Why can't $600 of MB Sirius have at least the same features?

I figured as much. I really didn't like what they did to the C class interior and liked the W211 so if it changes I hope I hate it!

I preferred when we as consumers had the choice. My last car offered XM or Sirrius. I prefer XM. I'm not sure if the display is a Sirius issue or MB issue but I'm guessing it's MB since there is a button for it. I may end up changing the speakers even though it's a lease because as much as I hate to admit it, the Harman system in there is nowhere near as good as even the Bose systems in other cars.

On a positive note, the car seams to be learning how I drive and accelerating better-when I got it I thought the pick up off the line was awful, but I guess the adaptive tranny does actually work.

The Title/Artist display not being on the main SAT screen was just a design decision by the software team. They just decided to put it on "page 2". With so much blank screen, I wonder why though.

They also should have displayed a volume level lumber pop up when you change the volume on all audio apps too.

Thanks for the info. There's a alot of silly little things that the design teams seam to have done in this car. Overall a fantastic car but the stupid little things that you notice. Here's a goofy one my wife picked up on(of course) ; when you put the visor down to use the mirror, the light above the visor goes on. Sounds great right? Problem is the mirror has a door, when you lift the door open it totally blocks the mirror's light. Every other car I've owned has the lights next to the mirror so they shine on your face (which is why you're using the mirror in the first place). It's little things like that, not enough to be angry, or not love the car, but you wonder what these PhD's in engineering were thinking.

The next time you hear about driver and passengers in a MB vehicle walking away from a horrendous accident, their thinking safety may come to mind.

Sure, good point, but does that mean they can't also make the little things work for $62k?
There are cars with better crash ratings out there that cost lots less. Call me old fashioned, but for the big bucks Benz gets I expect both.

Just get a Dash/window mount receiver. Costs $100 in Boston. Its not worth spending the money. I have an E500 '04. I thought the same things you did. I came from a 740IL and I expected a lot and all I got was a great driving car, but what happened to the features.