First Look: SiriusXM WX Now On ForeFlight

This is a big deal. Don't get me wrong: I love ADS-B weather, especially its price point, but in absolutely every other regard, SiriusXM has it beat hands-down. There are more and far better weather products, with greater fidelity and associated data. Because it gets its connection from a pair of satellites in a fixed orbit covering the whole USofA, you get reception from the ground on up to as high as you want to go. This is unlike ADS-B, which relies on the transmissions from ground-based transmitters. Want weather on the ground with ADS-B? You're out of luck.

On the subject of better weather products, with the SiriusXM Aviation Receiver you get a greatest hits collectionof the company's extensive catalog of weather products, including enhanced radar, that shows cells with greater detail and includes information on hail, echo tops, tornado-like activity and more. Of course, you get METARS, TAFS, Pireps, TFRs and winds aloft, but you also get graphical airmets/sigmets and TFRs. It's apples to oranges, ADS-B weather to SiriusXM's, with whichever fruit you like a lot better being the latter of the two.

The box you get from SiriusXM with the new SiriusXM Aviation Receiver is about the size of a brick, and the magic brick inside the box is way smaller than that, about the size of two standard issue iPhones stacked oneon top of the other. There's one button on the bottom of the unit, a micro-USB port (hooray for a standard plug) right next to it and, on the lower front face of the unit, a series of tiny LED lights to indicate the status of the receiver.

After I pulled the receiver out of the box, I fired it up, by guessing that I'd have to push the only button on the thing to make that happen. The only tricky part of the process was figuring out how to get the Bluetooth going...I resorted to the manual. Just hold the button down for a few seconds and you'll get the blue light.

Connecting it to my ForeFlight 8 on my iPhone took about 20 seconds. My phone immediately recognized the receiver and connected instantly. I then went back to ForeFlight, added the device in the aptly named "devices" tab, and I was in weather heaven.

If you've flown with XM in the cockpit, you know how great it is. Years ago, I was one of the first journalists to ever get to take it for a spin, and knew this product would make flying easier and safer, and it has. Today's announcement by ForeFlight makes it that much easier.

The SiriusXM Aviation Receiver goes for $699, but if you hurry you can cash in on a special offer by buying it from Sporty's or SiriusXM for $499. Then you can get an additional $200 rebate for a subscription package for ForeFlight before the end of the year. All of which means, if you're interested at all, now is the time to pull the trigger on an early holiday gift to yourself.

Visit ForeFlight for details.