The official name is XM WX Satellite Weather. Most pilots just call it XM Weather. The neat thing about it is that it offers virtually all available weather information and can be received and displayed on handheld units or on a variety of panel-mount units. There is an instrument panel docking station system available for the Garmin 396 and 496 handhelds that eliminates many of thewires that adorn the cockpit when these are used as a pure handheld, or mounted on the control column. Some of the panel-mount units don’t yet have the capacity to display all the information that XM broadcasts.
Another neat thing is that a popular Control Vision PDA-based unit with a moving map and XM Weather display sells for $1,495. A Garmin 396 is advertised for $2,195 and a 496 for $2,795. Any serious pilot, whether renting, flying club airplanes or owning an airplane, can now have the same in-flight weather information that is available to those flying the most sophisticated turbine airplanes, and for not a lot of money. This includes GPS navigation, even WAAS in some cases. And it is an easy and sure bet that more pilots will fly into this thunderstorm season with Nexrad displayed in the cockpit than ever before. Those Garmin units literally flew off the shelves last Christmas.
