Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems call me a cynic but....

The one thing that sticks out from the visit yesterday was Bob's and therefore the team's slightly dismissive attitutde towards downloads and downloaded material.

I genuinely believe, and i think i am not in the minority, that this is the way forward. there was talk of a 'huge' database of material on CD and DVD and therefore to excel in these formats was the preferred option BUT in my mind that material will also be out there to download in better and better resolution and a lot sooner than the mothership thinks.

Did Des at one point not say that the most asked question from their custom installers was 'how do you plug it into a network?'

I dont believe they have dismissed it (as they have not the HDMI issue) but maybe the wave of change is bigger than they think.

That said, I am a 100% fan of the big M after meeting everyone yesterday and am looking forward to the rest of 2007, there were many hints of new products coming this year.

could you clarify what the issue is? not sure i'm following. what is it bob is dismissing?

doody.

Downloaded material generally and the quality thereof, lack of material available compared to CD and DVD.

The feeling i got was that this area of the market was at least a couple of years away from being worthy of Meridian considering.

I agree that the answer didn't quite match the questions exactly. Server/non disc playback doesn't necessarily mean downloads.

Bob's point was valid about CD and catalogue availability was quite correct. I don't think server music means you stop buying CD's however. I, for one, have never downloaded anything for my SB3.

That CD player sales is up for M is also perhaps a result of the iPod kids 'discovering' music and finding that �5.95 for a chart CD delivered is actually fantastic value. Far better than a legit download costs.

Now, I'll stick my neck right out here and suggest that Bob, being the very clever chap he is, knew exactly what he was answering yesterday.

Will there be something in the M line up that "is the best" there can be in a given category of server music? I certainly hope so.

How many people would like to have a M server client rather than a SB/SB+/transporter/Airpot E etc etc.? Plenty I'd say.

The door is open I think.

hmmm, maybe.....

in fact i hope so!!

there was that throw away line of how terrible he thought the sound from an ae was....

So, a few thing emerge there then. Bob and Co. have listened to the SB type devices.

I think the main point is contained in the posts above. Yes, SDDVD and CDs have the biggest catalogue by far and will go on no matter what new formats come along. BUT what "high end" people want to do is copy these highly available discs onto a media server at home for convenience. This point was avoided in the Q&A.

The media server model is excellent as it is "future media proof" and allows the additional downloaded material mentioned above to be stored and accessed. Backup is a trivial matter as per data servers.

Perhaps there was a clue in the discussion on partnerships.Meridian have partnered Dolby , Faroudja and at least one high-end car company. Around the time of the much-vaunted 880 server solution there talking about partnering with iMerge.

So its not totally implausible that they will do something along those lines perhaps when they feel that they have developed their expertise to such a level that their product can be 'best in class'.

I think they can only launch so many products at a time but I'm sure it will be worth the wait when it happens.

Meridian arent Phillips or Sony. They dont tend to release the crap products just the best ones and only when they are ready.

~M~

P.S. I hope the Hd-DVD/Blu HDMI 2.5 player with in built video upscaling to 4k comes first

I think Bob's view was that music servers and related streaming devices were limited to the geakish minority (of which he believes us a part).

He does have a point, but as suggested above there is also an interest in such products from the customers of custom installers. And the investment required for a decent PC/server also takes such products out of the mass market and into that of the fairly affluent.

Bob did express a desire to increase the awareness of his brand, and music servers/streaming devices seems quite a unique opportunity to do just that, and with little cost other than some clever marketing; there are often posts on the Slimdevices forum enquiring about active speakers, and Meridian with its DSPs have a very unique solution for delivering the very best of quality for such requirements. Even if they don't want to jump right in and partner to produce a server or integrate a streaming product they should at lease be embracing the technology.

I was half expecting Bob to reach behind a table and reveal a music server product - or later in the day reveal that the F80 also fitted the bill.

Absolutely nothing was given away, so this is just my feeling, but I got the impression that music library playback of some form or other was being worked on and will be revealed when they feel that they are best in class.

I don't think we're going to see a music server or client any time soon, if at all. I'd like to be proved wrong (and I'd like a client, not a server).

If custom install is the growing market they seem to think it is, and custom install is "demanding" media servers, the “880” will come sooner than we think.

For me, I don't think these are easy every day items and the issues of operating system convenience and backup are far from easy (OK raid, redundancy etc. can make life easier but at a cost - but then cost has never been a problem for Meridian I think). That`s not a problem for me; I like tinkering with this sort of thing, but for someone who has actually shelled out $thousands on an all house system having to re-boot the server to access something when it hangs will become a serious annoyance.

Wireless is the big buzzword at the moment but for quality music and video transmission wireless isn't ready yet. IMHO.

My fear and, I suspect the major problem for Meridian, is that this whole area of “entertainment” is changing so fast that it is hard for them to keep up if they are going to produce quality products that they will maintain and support many years into the future. The very features that attract many of us to the Meridian brand can actually become a millstone around their neck when the goalposts start moving as quickly as I think they are moving at the moment.

What was very clear from the visit is that Meridian are committed to quality in everything they do, that they are very clever, know what they are doing both technically and in business and that they want to grow the brand and the company significantly. I think we are in for an exciting ride over the next few years.

Regards

Chris

I think the download approach is here to stay. Bob speaks only about the legal download options (logically) and i got the impression het thinks the quality is lacking there.

But there is a very big group of people out there which up- and download and are interested in quality as well.
For example the availability of film in High Definition format is not really a problem.
My collection of DVD's is about 400-500 and i have more films in HDTV by now.

The same is true for music, the lossless comunity is growing as well, and for example FLAC support would be nice. (We do have MP3 support in players, why not the better alternative ?)

Did the not legal sharing of MP3 not proceed the legal download options for MP3 ?

Could something like that not happen for .FLAC versions of Music, or possible even HDTV format movies ?
There are some initiatives launched with a download service for HDTV content.