A weakness of XM Radio is the reception. Here in Seattle we have terrestrial repeaters so reception is not terrible, however, if your equipment (tuner) is in a basement, like mine, you might have reception troubles which translate to either no audio or drop outs. To combat the problem, I ordered a Terk XM6 outdoor XM antenna. The installation is very simple. I have a near flat roof and all my roof based antennas are in one central location (see picture) so it was extremely easy. All the antenna calls for is a RG-6 cable between your tuner and the roof. When I built my house, I ran six RG-6 cables to the roof for this type of use.

The kit includes a F-Connector to XM antenna connector (SMB) which just screws to the end of your terminated RG-6. Then that just plugs into your antenna jack.

Before this upgrade, I had one to two bars on my XM tuner. Now, it reads full strength and have not experienced any drop outs. If you are experiencing XM reception problems, I highly recommend getting the Terk XM6 outdoor XM antenna.