Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems Market / Personal Confidence in Meridian

Well stated.

Ken

I have always thought of DSD as a path for the recording industry to seize back control of their primary assets. Having lost complete control of the standard CD, pushing DSD puts them back in the drivers seat, more akin to blu-ray. At some point I would imagine these studios will compel some (and then all) of their artists to only release their new works on DSD. These things always start with the fanatics and then become more mainstream as the tech becomes more mainstream. There are some companies that used to believe that HDMI wasn't going to last...

I wonder about DSP technology. You see a lot more of its being developed, with the latest bleeding edge cinemas going all digital, all DSP, with that technology making its way down to high-end personal cinemas. You are now seeing more room correction systems being done at the digital level (vs analog). That supports Meridians sticking to its guns on DSP, but does that support the considerable entry price? DSP used to be the almost exclusive domain of Meridian, not so today.

That's completely true in my experience - it's the mastering and recording quality that make 99% of whether a given recording sounds good. If that's right, you're most of the way there. After that, higher res media is just icing on the cake.

Absolutely.

I agree too. I don't really have any need to own anything beyond 24/96 as I believe the benefits are marginal at best anyway. I have one album in that resolution, the rest being ripped CDs, which I continue to buy.

+ more than 1.

Just finished listening to an EMI (or what was then an HMV) recording of Vaughan Williams' Oxford Elegy, which was recorded in the Summer 1968 and remastered for CD in 1999.

I had not heard this recording in almost 30 years, and only recently got hold of the OOP CD.

You know how a performance you heard a long time ago - live, broadcast or recorded - can have a hold on you, and how you can return to your 'old love' and be really disappointed?

There was no let down here: My 861v4 and 598 (and ATC SCM25A speakers) put me in the chapel at King's College, Cambridge, and showed me the extraordinary abilities of the EMI recording and mastering engineers through the years.

So, clearly, the quality of production is above everything else,except the quality of the equipment used to play back, and for me M have been the last word for a long time, although, as my fellow Yanks have pointed out, we have no such thing as customer service anymore from dealers over here. Without my ears telling me how good Meridian components are, because they disappear when the music or the movie starts, and without the HH Forum (and Rick at Audio Images) I'd have given up and gone elsewhere.

Regards,
Roger

Agreed!

Sorry, I disagree. While I don't disagree that mastering is the most important, but I can unequivocally say that the best sound I have ever heard from a CD, was playing a multi-channel SACD in my Esoteric player. I would love to use a Meridian, multi channel player. . Was it the SACD, was it the player or was it the multi-channel, I don't entirely know. I can tell you the player made good CD's sound good, and bad CD's sound terrible.

I don't think that's neccessarily a disagreement. I'll bet the same recording on CD still sounded great, it's just the multichannel and resolution added that extra layer of realism, etc!

On the other hand, if the original recording or mastering was mediocre, the SACD would have sounded equally mundane.

I'll wade in (and try to keep it on topic..)

Meridian Audio has grown in interesting new directions (Car Audio, in Range Rovers and McClaren super sports cars), new products (DACs, smaller speakers, round speakers, affordable Sooloos endpoints, new in-wall speakers).

Hopefully these developments will lead to (or has led already) to a profitable, healthy company, one that has enough money to invest in critical things like R&D and continual development of our beloved products.

In the United States, Meridian as a brand does not have as many followers as say, McIntosh with it's tube amps etc. But I feel that typical jazz lovers who would listen to Coltrane's Naima or "My Favorite Things" from Coltrane at Newport would fall like love with my (or your) DSP8000's.

Until the DAC's came out, there were no products that were an "impulse buy" with Meridian's "house sound". This is changing. Hopefully the Explorer and Director DAC's will introduce a new generation to the brand.

I've talked in depth to my HT dealer. The Meridian processor is no longer the one he "pushes". He finds the side-firing 8K's and 7.2K's harder to sell into a HT job. And Yet...

The DSP speakers are a cognitive leap for the average HT guy. Ditch separate amplifiers and put the DSP's in the speaker! Just listen, alright! Listen with your eyes closed to tracks you love. Does the music not feel alive ?

Of course M is not the same company it was... in many ways it is healthier ( more product lines, intro-level products, finally a HDMI solution that works, new DSP techologies to upsell like EBA and in-walls). a Pono tie-in next year might further invigorate it.

It might never play the latest SONY codec or 24/384 PCM. I have thousands of CD's it will play back, and play back superbly.