I recently purchased an 04. It had XM factory installed, so I activated it.

Sorry if this has already been addressed, but I notice on my 04 that the XM audio is substantially lower than the FM, CD or DVD audio.
Also, the treble, mid, bass and dsp settings all go back to neutral everytime I shut the car off (only for XM).
The settings on fm, cd and dvd are remembered.

Not to hijack the thread with multiple issues, but the xm reception is marginally better than AM radio. Every bridge I drive under, tall building I go by, hills or tall trees seem to blank out the reception for a short while. I understand reception is "line-of-sight", but you think the radio would buffer information to play in case of short disruptions in reception .. :(

I recently purchased an 04. It had XM factory installed, so I activated it.

Sorry if this has already been addressed, but I notice on my 04 that the XM audio is substantially lower than the FM, CD or DVD audio.
Also, the treble, mid, bass and dsp settings all go back to neutral everytime I shut the car off (only for XM).
The settings on fm, cd and dvd are remembered.

Not to hijack the thread with multiple issues, but the xm reception is marginally better than AM radio. Every bridge I drive under, tall building I go by, hills or tall trees seem to blank out the reception for a short while. I understand reception is "line-of-sight", but you think the radio would buffer information to play in case of short disruptions in reception .. :(

I know this is old, but I thought I would address this issue. This is a common problem for our vehicle's. GM is aware of the issue, and have posted information concerning such.

#PIC3776A: XM Volume is Lower than the Radio Bands

The following diagnosis might be helpful if the vehicle exhibits the symptom(s) described in this PI.

Condition/Concern:
Some customers may report that the XM volume is lower than the CD and/or other radio bands. This is a normal operating characteristic of the system.

Recommendation/Instructions:
DO NOT replace any parts and/or attempt to repair this concern.

Please follow this diagnostic or repair process thoroughly and complete each step. If the condition exhibited is resolved without completing every step, the remaining steps do not need to be performed.

Thanks for posting the latest information Dianoz!!!

I've read about this issue in previous threads, (--especially in the CTS-V community for over four years now) and it got me thinking a little more about it. . .

Awhile back, I posted my experience installing an aftermarket XM antenna in lieu of the GM unit. The XM reception in my XLR is as good (maybe better in some ways --as far as channel separation is concerned) than FM --except as noted in your post regarding Loss of Signal in heavily-wooded areas and solid obstructions like concrete, etc. A five-second buffer would be the answer, but maybe I'm thinking too hard.

I have the standard "wart" XM antenna on my CTS-V (same year as my XLR) and it's sound quality is between really good AM and pretty grim FM. It's volume is definately lower. The main difference in both of my cars appears to be the antennas. I haven't cross-referenced the part numbers of the XM receivers to see if they're identical, --though I'll look into that.

So I have to wonder if the antenna is the culprit. You could bypass your antenna with the TERK I used to see if it improves your receiver gain for a moderate price.

GM has a newer version of "the wart" available for the XLR, which includes great instructions, a drilling template, adhesive-backed foil to place on the underside of the trunk and an extended antenna that protrudes from the wart. I bought it a few months ago, but couldn't bear the thought of drilling through my decklid so it's been sitting on a shelf. Supossedly, it offers much better reception, but the little dash-mounted magnetic TERK antenna I subsequently installed exceeded my expectations.

When I see the write-up, "Some customers. . . " that is suspect in itself. Either all the systems are engineered wrong, or some of them are built differently and are displaying these symptoms. That IS NOT normal. They should all be experiencing the problem or "some customers" that do really HAVE a problem with their entertainment systems. This is illogical and a cop-out to addressing what the customer perceives as an issue. A gain issue is easily checked by expected versus actual measurements. If all XLR OEM XM radios have lower outputs than the other audio entertainment selections, this is an engineering oversight.

Reception (when not counting obstacles) is affected by a number of things including impedance, cable length, gain of the receiver, antenna grounding, orientation and type.

As far as it not keeping pre-sets. . . . that's weird. I'm ruling out operator error, since you've been able to get your other pre-sets working. Is your vehicle's software up to the latest rev ?

I'll check out the receivers in both vehicles and report back tomorrow.

CC :seeya