Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Streaming Meridian Audio transfers software apps business to Roon Labs

I never quite got my head round all the Sooloos bits and pieces - perhaps because I've never taken the plunge - but now I'm even more confused. Hopefully though this announcement will turn into a simplification in the long run when both M and Roon make some product announcements.

In the meantime, I will continue to stream Spotify and CD rips via SBT / DSP5000s, wonder whether I will ever need an ID40 in my 861, toss up the merits of 5200SEs vs 6Ks as my next speaker (probably my next 'investment') and await developments.

I empathise with those who bought into Sooloos with certain expectations and hope you don't end up too disillusioned. You still own one of the best-sounding systems money can buy.

Crion, as Carl says above, it is wide of the mark to say the Sooloos team is gone. AFAIK, there has been a small team at Meridian HQ, UK that manage Sooloos 2.1/2.2 and the iOS apps. The team that built HP Connect (based outside the UK), was working on Sooloos 3.0 and now Roon ... 2 different groups.

I'm very confused now. I just bought a C15 as I thought it would be future proof for MQA. Hope I'm not going to get disappointed.

Although, at this stage, I suspect Sooloos is unlikely to undergo much further development, the upside is that the replacement hardware, for example a mac mini (or even a QNAP device), will cost much less than an MD600.

So, while a little frustrated, I also believe the future will be brighter with what is likely to be better software running on less expensive equipment.

I had a NAD Master series M50 / M52 (music vault and streamer) it sounded good through my AC200 and DSP3200 a lot better then streaming from my Mac.

I traded it in recently for the MS600 / MD600 and the jump in sound quality was amazing my girlfriend noticed immediately and she�s not a HiFi buff.

The Sooloos app is better then the NAD app but that�s a visual thing I buy HiFi for the sound, if the Sooloos app doesn�t change from how it is now that�s fine by me beats going through a stack of records or draws of CD�s.

I believe you're fine on MQA support. Meridian will continue to support Sooloos and will add MQA support.

As it is an audio end point (apart from Store and Core and UI), I would expect that you can use it with Roon as such.
But would need seperate NUC / Mac Mini style device to run Roon on and tablet to navigate.

Then C15 could probably still serve as storage over its samba share.

In short, on the Meridian track you are fine, on the new Roon experience, perhaps the C15 is not the most optimal device.

Thought the following quote from Danny over at the Roon community would be interesting to share:

I bought the Control:15 primarily as, guess what, a control, definitely not as an audio end point.

It seems with Roon it will just be an audio end point and storage, unless Meridian brings out an upgrade of some sort.

I really hope they will, otherwise it will be a real shame.

I think these quotes from July 2014, on this forum, give a different flavour though...



Those contributing to this thread were certainly under the impression they were talking about the next iteration of Sooloos.

It is a trivial matter to confirm that Roon Labs LLC was incorporated in New York on 15th January 2015; this is not something that has happened overnight.

Clearly a good deal of discussion and planning has gone into this.

Those quotes from Enno explain that the Sooloos was reimagined 5 years ago, starting fresh, and that it turned into a HP product (the JLR stuff never went anywhere).

We did indeed put in a ton of design development effort into what was next for Meridian Sooloos. That project never shipped for various business and product reasons. I think this is what some people feel let down by. Sorry guys, product building has its ups and downs. No one was let down by this more than Enno and I.

Forming Roon Labs was a solution to long term business strategy on both sides. It will result in great product for everyone: Meridian, Roon, and others. It will also open up new possibilities, not deemed viable before.

I'll give you one example of many: I never could get Airplay support into Sooloos for various reasons. However, we all have kids' rooms or kitchens that don't require the quality and cost that Meridian endpoints carry. Roon will allow you to throw an Airplay capable speaker in those locations (like the Libratone line or the B&W A5/A7), or use the AppleTV2 you might already have there, and use the same interface and music library everywhere. As Roon, this offering doesn't hurt Meridian's impeccable quality offering by introducing a far inferior product in the system. Roon wins by giving you the same experience in non-Meridian setups, Meridian wins by being able to be paired with people that require these setups, and users win by having options.

Moving forward with Sooloos I believe the Meridian folks do indeed have a new strategy. I have only heard back channel talk, and don't have any official word. Roon + Sooloos has been discussed many times, and the possibility of Roon running on Sooloos/Meridian hardware has been on the table.

I'm with you, in that I also look forward to seeing their roadmap :-)

Appreciate the background Danny; it's not always necessary to see how sausages are made , but sometimes putting matters into context is helpful.