Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion MQA - Related technology, products and music MQA solution into my DSP speakers?

Quoting myself from a parallel thread in hope that someone here can shed some light:

I seem to remember that when I bought my 598DP and 568.2mm combo back in 2003, M stated that the player supplied 96k multi-channel OR 192k STEREO from DVD-Audio discs via MHR to the surround unit.

Why make that claim if there wasn't some sonic benefit through the 96k speakers at the time? Couldn't MQA do likewise today?

HD621 also accepts 192k via HDMI.

All Ms' product literature for the longest time during the 24/96 era claimed that 'a future firmware update' would bring 24/192 capability to DSP speakers. Well, now would be a great time, guys

The wording in the early DSP8000 manuals was subtly different:

Did anyone request details?

Matt.

yes they missed a bit "and relevant hardware upgrades to support the new firmware and cable connections"

That would be the SE upgrade, no?

That's the frustrating part, though, isn't it? 'Firmware upgrade' specifically implies that no hardware modifications would be needed to attain 24/192. Perhaps that didn't matter back in the days when many people believed rates about 24/96 couldn't make a difference (ahem), but now, it does.

If M were willing to roll out the promised FW update, I could foresee another niche in the DSP hierarchy with some legacy speakers capable of accepting properly decoded MQA at 24/192 instead of 24/96, but without, of course, the benefits of higher bandwidth electronics or beryllium tweeter, which would be the pinnacle of the lineup when an SE is bought or upgraded.

Bruce or any other HH in the know -

How would you configure and control an 818 or 218 positioned between a processor (in my case an 861) and the main L&R speakers? The processor and 818/218 both want to be the controller. I get that you can pick the Sooloos endpoint on the iPad to send audio stream to the 818 or 861. But how would the volume on the 818 be controlled when it simply passes thru the L/R multichannel audio. And when playing multi channel sound, how would the 818 handle the various sources connected to the processor.

My PP has communicated with his M source and they say a 3rd party system rf controller would be needed (to separately communicate to the 818 and processor). Feels rather a kluge. Any of you HH'ers have an alternative /cleaner scheme?

Thanks.

It would be ideal if M could add a 2-channel full fat MQA option to their multichannel processors, but I am told not to hold my breath.

Don't have a multichannel setup at present and not tried this, but would it be possible to configure Controller/Not Controller per-source, so that when you press e.g., SLS for 2-ch MQA, the 818 becomes Con, and when you select, e.g., DVD for multichannel use the 861 becomes Con?

The controller is simply the IR receiver. Set the 218 as NCON (non controller) and stick with existing controller.

For volume, the DSP speakers handle this, the controller simply tells them what volume to play as. It doesn't matter what the source is.

However, I would query whether you want an 861 being daisy chained through a 218. Part of what marks out the 800 series is the quality of the digital outputs, in particular timing/jitter. I suspect that the 218 will be inferior to the 861 in that regards and that there is the potential for degradation in audio quality.

There may be some merit in connecting the 218 to DSP's via SpeakerLink, and connecting 861 L/R to coax input (D2) - may need a Reviver or similar if 861 does not offer coax out. This would require the DSP to be reprogrammed for any sources that would now be coming in via D2.

Yes, I was trying to make my query as general as possible, and reference Bruce's reply to me that specifically mentioned the 218. But in my case, I would like to insert an 818 for optimal SQ.