Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Streaming Sooloos Ongoing Development

About 2GB for an average sized collection... will be higher for larger libraries... as Roon loads the Roon database into Ram to ensure it runs smoothly.

Optimizations will occur to reduce this... but likely not by an amount sufficient to run on small RAM PC's

Roon is currently 32bit on Macs... think it's the same on Windows... with again plans to change this in the future

So it sounds like upgrading existing Sooloos hardware to 4GB would work. I tried this with my MC200 but as I didn't notice any difference with Sooloos, and I had a problem with once stick from the supplied matched pair, I sent the RAM back didn't bother with replacing it.

I would imagine the same would be true of C10/15 which, as you say, leaves the inadequacies of the screen both in terms of touch panel and speed which I am sure could be worked around if Roon wanted to.

I assume that Roon on non native .Net machines is still based on Mono like Sooloos was so that should be relatively straight forward to deploy on *nix based machines if they don't already support that.

So theoretically, if the desire was there from both parties, not entirely out of the question.

Simplifying my answer here......

There is a 23-inch Touchscreen Lenovo Core i5 with 8Gb of Ram on Amazon right now for £500, that will easily run the current Roon app

So the questions for Control:15 owners are

a) How much will it cost to upgrade my Control:15 to run a version of the Roon app allowing for all the items below [and probably some I haven't considered]

* an SSD Drive
* a RAM upgrade
* an upgrade to the Graphics Processor and Chipset to allow it to run OpenGL 3.0, which is largely what Roon uses to achieve its graphical speed
* a new OS Licence
* the Labour Costs of removing the current components and replacing with the items above
* the installation and testing with the new OS and modified Roon app to make sure everything is hunky dory

b) Is the total cost of the above likely to be less than the above £500, after factoring in all handling and shipping charges etc., especially when manhours are usually the most costly part of such upgrades and testing

c) even after all of the above is done, how comparable will the UI EXPERIENCE be with the modified Roon app on IMHO a below par Resistive screen ... by comparison to running the optimal Roon app on a modern Capacitive screen with much faster Processor and RAM??

I could ask the same series of questions about how the costs of upgrading say an MD600 to meet the needs of the Roon app... and how those costs compare to the £250 price of a decent QNAP 251... and more importantly, after upgrading how will the actual User Experience compare??

In simple terms, there's a very good reason why most people and Companies just go out and buy new Computers [never mind Toasters, Coffee Makers and Phones], rather than just continually upgrading their older "devices"... and the reason is that it simply costs too much to upgrade old kit... and in the end, the User Experience is compromised anyway, as in general New Kit will always Outperform Old Kit [even after Upgrades]

Sooloos 3 was never going to be free.

Is there a source for that info? Because it was posted elsewhere that Sooloos equipment owners merely get a licence to use the software rather than ever actually owning it. This would imply that 'updates' were to be free of charge/included in hardware cost.

Just Curious

~M~

Hi Manus
Hope you're well

All Software is "sold" or "subscribed" to on the basis of a licence... As obviously the owner doesn't own the code

FWIW, all those Silver Discs that we all have in our houses [CD's; DVD; Blurays] are also sold on the basis of not "owning" the music... but granting us a licence to play it

So, the Windows 7 or Office 2013 package that you might have on your computer right now was purchased on the basis of a "licence to use it"... not to "own" it

And when Windows 10 and Office 2016 comes along, Microsoft will charge you to upgrade your licence to use the new version... for 30 years past, this was an upfront charge... but many companies have now moved to the Subscription model... as have most Users and Companies

Summary: Sooloos 3 was never likely to be free... primarily given the previously outlined Thousands of manhours that went into building the new app from the ground up

Just to make the conversation specific to Meridian...

As we all know and appreciate, Meridian have issued valuable "free" Firmware updates in the past ... these updates have included Apodizing in our Processors... and Time Alignment in our DSP's

However, Meridian have also seen fit to charge us not inconsiderable sums when moving the product forward in what they consider a "considerable" manner

Hence the charges that we are all aware of for the move from the 861v6 to v8... or 818v1 to v2... or DSP7200.1 to .2... or the recent SE Upgrade prices to DSP's

Sooloos 3 [or Roon as it is now] is a similar "paradigm shift" in performance... and there is little doubt from Meridian's history that they would have seen fit to charge for it, just as they have in the past

Except that when we bought into Sooloos, since no ongoing costs were mentioned in terms of software upgrades, the implication was that in paying the hefty entry price for Sooloos, which was never available software only, but only bound in with Meridian hardware, we were paying for free upgrades to the software aspect? I certainly never expected to have to pay for software upgrades to Sooloos, and for example, with Naim streaming software, etc., upgrades are free as long as you have the Naim hardware to run it?

Personally, I'm happy with my MC200 and just an iPad 'remote' so if Sooloos just added track level metadata and a few other nice bits, or as Ian suggested, a specially licensed version of Roon for Meridian customer which runs on their existing hardware, that would be great.

As long as the hardware supports the new version of sw, which is where we are with Sooloos.

Russ

And I assume your PP made it explicitly clear to you before he sold you your 818v2 that Upgrades would cost approx 25% of the RRP??... i.e. that he made a specific point of mentioning that before your purchase??

As regards the rest... pictures paint a thousand words!!

Hi Ronnie,

As you've said software/firmware has tended to be free but I dont believe that even those of us with a ' hard neck' would expect hardware upgrades to be free They have always had a premium price tag.

I'm still trying to get my head round it all as per thread title. I'm sure you remember years ago when DVD-A arrived the moaners said they didn't want to turn on a screen to access their music (of course they didn't really have to either if only they had RTFM ) but now 'interacting' with the music library and associated info is all the rage. Nothing to do with better sound quality as such, unless M's Sooloos integration brings that to the table with MQA , but still desirable. The only thing I miss about vinyl is the sleeve notes and artwork and Roon certainly brings great ideas.

Fair point too about those pesky silver discs all around the house just being 'on loan', but it never stopped me getting into Squeezebox/Dune/Kodi type products just for easier personal use and dare I say it ' interactivity ' :O)

Exciting Times,
Best,

~M~

Lol.

Well, no, but there is a history of hardware upgrades being paid, but as far as I'm aware Sooloos updates haven't been in the past?