> Foliage certainly has an effect on SDARS signals -- over 2
> GHZ, thats near those of your microwave oven. Big
> difference on narrow tree-lined 2-lane roads -- one of the
> extremely few benefits winter provides. Since foliage even
> attenuates 800 MHz-band cell phones (even the cell companies
> include foliage in the fine print in their variations in
> coverage info) and yet lower UHF TV frequencies, it's
> obvious it would degrade XM & Sirius reception.
>
I was hoping someone would address this technically... Think of it this way, how does normal radio behave when something’s in the way? Exactly, the higher in frequency you go, the more line of sight radio waves become.
A cell example. People have often asked which cell phone company is the best. Ok, well there are many factors that can determine what ranks a cell phone company as "the best", but if we choose to compare based on reception lets use this example. For our example, let's pretend we have 2 different cell towers (Verizon and Cingular) 5 miles away for the location you're standing and you walk inside a building. A Verizon CDMA 800Mhz cell phone will receive more RF energy from its tower then the Cingular 1900Mhz (1.9Ghz) GSM phone. More RF energy (most of the time) means better reception. The lower frequency has larger wavelengths and can penetrate the walls of a building better.
Ever wonder why AM reception goes so much further then FM radio stations. In the simplest of terms, the same idea applies. Not AM, not FM, it’s XM (only joking).
Hope this helps…
-RadioEnginerd<P ID="signature">______________
If you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything...</P>