Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems Media player discussion (moved from 861v6 thread)

PS here's the most recommended list of media players:

01 - PCH A-200
02 - Mede8er MedX500
03 - HDI BD Prime 3.0 (Hybrid)
04 - PCH C-200 (Hybrid)
05 - TviX N1 (No internal HDD)

I just tested the Sigma based Popcorn Hour A/C200 player I can say to you that the sound is superior (read: bitperfect = perfect HD audio) from the Sigma (ie Dune/Popcorn Hour) while the video quality is on par with Theater+/Oppo BD1. There are Bluray menus but that's not too important for me. The networking settings are straightforward and logging onto your NAS is very fast via the shortcut. The file directory is nicely organized. Subtitles nicely integrated. Advanced features are feature-rich.

I would recommend without hesitation the PCH A/C-200 over any other media player. I am not a fan of Dune for various reasons that I won't get into.

JerryL check out Popcorn Hour you won't be disappointed with the a/v quality and the simple interface is quite good -- it is a perfect match for the HD621. (You can also set up YAMJ for a slick interface with movie pictures and direct imdb info/ratings of each title. It's very similar to the Sooloos in that regard.)

Hope this helps and sorry for being contrarian crion but I'm not a fan of Dune and Popcorn Hour is superior in every way. My 2nd choice is the Theater+.

Good for you, now I would like to read about the latest 861v6 encounters with DSP setups

I'm sure a moderator will park all this media player chat into a new thread soon

At some point

Before the Dune Base 3.0, I owned both the Popcorn A100 and A110. The first thing I realized after the switch is how much better the SPDIF output of the Dune 3.0 is.

I am not familiar with the A200/C200. I chose the Dune 3.0 mainly for two reasons:
1. More mature firmware (situation december 2009)
2. Multichannel PCM output

For Meridian owners number 2 is a must. Whether you use a HD621 or not. That is the only way you get the new surround formats into your Meridian. The Popcorn will only do multichannel bitstream output.

As for the HD621/Dune 3.0 combo. The Dune 3.0 does not automatically bitstream DD as per standard Meridian HD621 setup, but is decodes everything to multichannel PCM. I did some A/B tests, but could not hear the difference.

Occassionaly I have an audio dropout. Strange thing is that this only occurs when the source is a DVD (watched a lot of Farscape lately). Cannot remember this has ever happened when Blu-Ray was a source. Another thing that happens is a brief pink flash whenever the HDMI handshake between the Dune and HD621 is done.

For the rest I am very pleased with the Dune 3.0 Everything I still want to watch I have on my NAS. All the rest I have stored on seperate hard drives, which I can slot into the Dune 3.0

All nicely indexed with cover art and information, using MyMovies. Very Sooloos like :-)

Very nice Robbo.

Yes would love to read about the 861v6 (esp. w/ HD621 and all DSP sys).

I wish i had known about the HDI Dune BD Prime 3.0 before i bought my Popcorn Hour C-200.
The popcornHour does not decode DTS-HD or Dolby True HD, but it does play FLAC audio and all video formats perfectly.

I am hoping Popcornhour will get licencing to allow internal decoding of the high resolution Bluray lossless formats.
Then i can feed the multi channel PCM into my HD621.

Otherwise i will have to sell my popcornhour, and get the Dune.

For now i have to use the Oppo BDP83 for Bluray HD audio PCM decoding.

WOW- that Dune 3.0 seems to be amazing. You can store BRs and play them back as if the playback was via the Oppo! I am going to explore this. Thank you!!! Will the Dune play 1080p/24? I am betting it does but I am unable to find this yet on their website. My question is answered in the affirmative. WOW. They say they are shipping in 3 days for the USA.... OK whose your favorite provider of NAS devices?

When playing 24/96 or 16/44 audio, i wonder how the sound quality of the Dune3.0 using its PCM output via HDMI into an HD621 compares with a Meridian Sooloos, or popcornhour C-200, Logitech Transporter etc?

Interesting the video quality of Dune is as good as the Oppo.
Guess there is no point in holding onto my Oppo and popcorn.
The Dune seems the perfect solution to meet all audio and video needs.

That is the real question -- will there be a difference? Popcorn does HD audio out into the HD621 in 5.1. I have not compared the Dune because I had some issues with the player.

I may get the Dune just to compare

Am also looking at it as it may provide the perfect way to stream multi-channel DVDA files (in the absence of an M solution for this). It seems quite straight-forward to get multi-ch .WAV from MLP and therefore multi-ch FLAC from the DVDA. Foobar and WinAMp etc have no issue playing MC FLAC and as 5.1 FLAC is listed on the Dune website, I believe/hope it may to do the job. It has multi-ch SPDIF outputs also doesn't it ?

Crion may be able to add to this possibility with his experiences.

At �360 it's worth trying I would think.

Yes, the Dune will play 1080p24, as well as 1080p23.98 It can switch automatically to the correct framerate (23.98, 24, 50, 59.94)

I am using a Thecus N5200 (5x500GB in RAID5), which is still running fine after 3 years. Maybe today I would opt for 2x2TB RAID0.

Both QNAP and Synology are the better brands with lots of possibilities to feed every PC and/or Mediaplayer in the house. Ofcouse you can put your entire BR collection online (a 2TB hard drive will hold about 50), but with decent disc failing protection (RAID6, RAID0) your are looking into a serious NAS (ie. QNAP TS809).

This is why I only keep the 'still to watch' stuff 'online' (I always turn the NAS off after watching, I do not like to leave equipment turned on when I don't use it). All the rest I put on single hard drives, and use it as a 'floppy' in the Dune Base 3.0 hard drive slot. No protection against disc failure ofcourse this way and at the moment no way of browsing your entire collection, since the MyMovies information is stored per hard drive. But the latest Dune firmware now allows for hard links, so I am looking into the possibility of putting all MyMovies information on my NAS or a USB stick and hope that the hard link will pop up a message if (ie. 'drive xx not found'), so I know which hard drive the movie is on)

Another possiblity is building a server (ie. Unraid server allows for up to 19 hard drives) and use Wake-On-Lan to take the server out of standby whenever the Dune is turned on.