Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems Recapping DSP5000s

I actually exchanged a few emails with that seller - mostly out of curiosity, but also to let him know that the initial photos he posted showed some very loose tweeter mount screws. The pair you’re looking at are factory upgraded to 96/24 with fairly old and faded upgrade labels. Probably old tweeters as well, given that he had loosened the screws to clean and touch up paint for rust (coastal California?). So probably new tweeters to consider.

Good news is that the fellow has serviced the resistors himself. He is an engineer with extensive hand soldering experience. However, he has only done one of the two speakers as he felt the other looked fine at the time. I imagine you might be able to talk him into replacing the caps as well as doing the other resistors - and perhaps this is what you might mean by “something in the works”.

That said, the price is at the higher end of the range. You might check the restaurant here. All_In has a pair listed on which he did caps and resistors himself and are for sale at a lower price. And you are getting an experienced HHer’s support. And much closer (New Jersey) for shipping.

This thread has run a bit OT - so in the spirit of keeping OnT (one good thing you’ll learn about this forum is that it is moderated and kept on topic) - we have to my knowledge only identified Marc Koval (official Meridian service for US) and Bruce (CMB Integrations), our PP in US as doing recap work here in the US. I have not seen either of their current rates posted so you have to inquire.

Thanks for your input - much appreciated. I've already talked via PM with All-In, K. Tsai, and Bruce (CMB Integration) and they have all been very helpful and friendly to me, and are working on things for me.

Everyone here seems great - I'm glad I found this place before just blindly purchasing from eBay.

I promised an update when I made my decision, so here it is.

I ended up purchasing a pair of "smiley face" DSP5000s in black ash from K. Tsai. He was very informative and patient with my questions. A pleasure to deal with.

All_In was very helpful to me as well, as he has a set of older re-capped DSP5000s for sale that I considered, but he cannot ship and he is too far for me to drive. Still, knowing that, he was very helpful to me and provided good information and advice.

SMB Integrations - Bruce is providing me with a 561 to use as a preamp/controller. Thank you Bruce!

So my tiny office (11' x 12' x 7.5' ceiling) will soon have the following:

Technics SL-5 Turntable
Sony DVP-NC875V SACD Changer
PC analog output (Sirius XM, XFinity Music Choice, iTunes, YouTube)
Meridian 561
Meridian DSP5000 x 2
NHT SuperZero x 2 (for rear ambience)
Acurus A250 AMP (for the NHTs)
And possibly my Episode 8" Subwoofer (that I am currently using with my NHTs)

I think I should be good for a while (but now I'm thinking I might need to upgrade my PC sound card to one with a digital output. Anyone have any suggestions? Preferably under $100).

Thanks again to all the members who made this process so enjoyable. I have wanted DSP-5000s since I first heard them back in the mid-90's. I can't believe I'm finally getting a pair! I'm excited.

Hi Dan,

Congratulations on your purchase. DSP5000s are great speakers- enjoy!

Best,
John

Hello Everyone,

I read another thread and a question popped up in my head. When sending in DSP5000s to be re-capped, do you ship the whole speaker or can you just remove the electronic boards and send them in?

For some reason I was thinking the whole speaker would need to be shipped, but now I'm thinking not. Is it hard to take the boards out?

This is all hypothetical of course. My DSP5000s should be arriving Friday and I want to enjoy them for a long while before considering re-capping.

Thanks for any feedback.

Hi Dan,

The re-cap work is all done on the back panel. There is a thread on here regarding how to carefully remove the back panels of the DSP5000s (it may be on the wiki also).

Best to get them and enjoy them- the re-cap can be done at any time.

Thanks for the info, All_In. Helpful as always.