Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems CES 2010 speculation thread

That's a good start!

Also, if Meridian is not going to want the units back, allow the trade-in based off a proper receipt/bill-of-sale and let us recoup some of the cost by selling our old 861s privately. So, if for example, the upgrade were currency agnostic at around $11K, and a v4 could command $3K on the used market, now we're talking an outlay of $8K which I think most people could at least accept as reasonable.

PS - I suppose Meridian has some motivation to get older units off the market, so are they obligating the dealers to destroy them?

What upgrade pricing structure would you suggests? How much should it cost to upgrade:

861V1->V6
861V2->V6
861V3->V6
861V4->V6

You seem to have intimated that purchasers of a used 861 should be treated differently than those who bought new. If that is the case (and I may have misunderstood you), what further cost adjustments, if any, should be made for the buyer of a new 861 vs. a used 861?
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Here is the pricing that seems fair to me. I would also expect program to work similarly in UK too.

861V1->V6 $20k
861V2->V6 $20k
861V3->V6 $15k
861V4->V6 $11k ($8k w/receipt showing purchased new as v4 from dealer)

Well on my receipt is a 861 v2.5, but i have upgraded to v3 and v4
What do i have to pay ?

There will be many more like me..

Yes, I would think it fair that anyone who bought the unit new and had it upgraded to v4 should get the same treatment as somebody who bought a v4 new. But it is, i suspect, a moot point as the program is unlikely to change.

In my grid your unit would be $11k. The only distinction I made from the actual version number the unit is at today is where the unit was purchased new as a v4 and thus the owner never saw any upgrade benefit at all from their purchase.

Only if you arrange for all the thousands and thousands of products that are more expensive for us to buy in the UK than if we bought direct from overseas - evern with exchange rates, taxes, duties etc. The CAD package I use costs �1495 in the US, it costs �1470 here. The UK distributor want their share for the work that they have to do. I just have to accept it as the US version won't work over here.

99/100 the price differential is in favour of the US, but now its one of the few occasions its gone against you, everyone is suddenly up in arms against it.

Why don't you gets just get over global pricing differentials, book a plane ticket to the UK and do the upgrade personally in the UK. We have some nice historical places that you may want to visit whilst you are over here.

I actually have an upcoming business trip to London so that might be an option for me. I have never brought anything but a suitcase with me on a trip before. What would I be facing as far as customs/duties when I boarded my flight back to the U.S with a v6 in tow?

As am I...but not terribly comvenient but, then again, for a USD 6,000 savings...

Another thing to note is that I finally connected with my dealer and he too is beside himself...he is writting M an e-mail advising them that essentially all/most of his 861 clients have contacted him and are seriously considering not upgrading...I wonder how M will respond...

I think there is the cost of the upgrade and then for those of us with digital speakers there is the added cost of new black (or silver?) boxes in the form of several AC12s. On the flip side they are entitled to make money. I don't know how it shakes out. Maybe Meridian feels the dollar will continue to get weaker so they want to set our prices higher so they are not constantly raising prices. I have absolutely no idea. If I were running things and if I didn't have to worry about what their costs are I would think John H's upgrade pricing would be about right. But that is a lot of "if"s. Im not upset with Meridian I am just weighing the cost and benefits and I will come to a decision. I wonder if when they began designing the latest generation of products Meridian was sensitive enough to the fact that the bottom has fallen out on many fortunate individuals and there are going to be less of them around. My costs (taxes, insurance, etc) are way up and I don't expect them to go down...

I think for those who are analogue after the 861 the upgrade is very marginal at best. Maybe apodizing will swing it for some. I for one won't be upgrading just for the 7.1 from my HD621 at the cost of �8,000 (including extra cards). That said I have a separate preamp for music which bypasses my 861. The 861 v4 will, I am sure, continue to be great for films. In addition lots of us have VPs which make some of the 861 redundant anyhow.

Rob

Depends on your defenition of 'hardly'. According to CinemaSquid, they currently count 220 unique Blu-ray discs (235 in total) with 7.1 Audio. Excluding the Region-duplicates (I counted 27 of them and counting all versions of a movie as only one) there are 193 Blu-ray discs with 7.1 audio. If you include a few that are not on their site (like many Asian discs), or if you would include 7.1 audio-streams not currently available on Blu-ray, you easily get more than 200 titles with 7.1 audio.

By the time you have seen or listened to many of these ones available, there will already be many more 7.1 discs available, and so on and so forth. Yes, you probably won't like all of these titles, but still, calling it 'hardly any discs' would not be accurate IMHO. Just my $0.02.

Edit: here is the link: 7.1 audio titles
By the way, have any of you seen/heard 'Chris Botti: Live in Boston' already, with it's 96kHz/24bit 7.1-channel audio-track?

Yes, I think you may well be right. Perhaps the better course would be to get hold of a second-hand 808.2, sell my 800, and the only thing I'd be missing is a 7.1 input - OK, I'd lose MCH DVD-A capability, but my Oppo can handle that and last time I checked I only had about 10 discs anyhow.