Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems Meridian Gear and Smart Plugs

Quite a few of my household appliances are now on smart plug/sockets, which enable me to turn the power on or off remotely as well as measure how much power they use. So far I have not used the on/off capability for any of my Meridian gear but I can see how much juice they use on standby. For older kit it can be quite a lot by modern standards, e.g. 562V is around 10W on standby and hardly more when it's on. Even newer kit such as the DSP5200SEs use about 8W each, (maybe something to do with the power amps needing to "warm up"?).

So I'm proposing to start using the smart plugs to turn them off instead of groveling around the back for the power switches. Is anyone else doing this? I notice that a number of Meridian products can have power supply issues so would disconnecting them this way rather than the power switch make a difference? I have to say that I suspect running at 8 to 10W in standby for long periods may be a good way to shorten the life of a PS. Electrical Engineers would doubtless know better.

Do any of the products have batteries that gradually go flat if you leave the appliance unplugged for long periods? (like one of my computers and a very old Hitachi tuner?)

cheers

John

I've used various ones over the years with no real problems. In the UK Toolstation had a recent offer on the TP Link Tapo P100 plugs (3 for £21) and I converted a load of the old radio controlled ones I was using to these and expanded the range of stuff I was switching off rather than keep in stand-by. Partly this was triggered by getting solar panels and being able to see just how much power was "always-on" in my house. I've now got them on all the TVs and hifi systems round the house and my wife seems to have accepted the extra hassle of switching stuff on via her phone or iPad with reasonably good grace. I dont switch off stuff that doesn't quickly and happily reboot - like my MD600 and a home server that runs back-ups and LMS round the house; I also bought a couple of the P110 which monitor power use and can see that those 2 use about 1Kw a day between them. They now go off if we're away for a night or two. But my office printer that gets used once a month can go off. I think I'm saving several Kw per day...

The only issues I have is an MS200 that isnt hardwired to the rest of the network (it's via a powerline ethernet bridge thing) doesn't rejoin the usable endpoints as quickly as it should, I did try leaving it powered on all the time when it annoyed me but at present am trying to teach myself to be more patient. And I have a DSP5000 that seems to like powering back up in the IL65 calibration set-up and needs retyping to escape. it used to do this before in a different system, perhaps once every couple of months so I'll live with it.

The MD600/MC200 (and previous Sooloos units) do have a CR2032 type button battery, they last years anyway and I'm not sure if stored, power-off, they go flat quicker, easy enough to replace anyway. I'm not aware of any rechargable cells in any of the kit. With a couple of G68s that I had before I decided that being continuously powered on was as likley to do harm as switching on for use, I'd already replaced powersupplies and the relevant capacitors etc before so it was where I was happy to accept the risk. I've since replaced them with 861's with LPS and like to hope they are rather more robust in the long term (and they are off at the smart-plug when not actually in use too).

I'm not particularly into this smart home thing but do like the ability to program lights to come on and go off at sunrise/sunset, seems nicely intuitive and clever that it knows where I live to know when the sun gets up!

Regards

Richard

I've been fully powering down my AV equipment for many years. Probably 15 or so. Using standby saver infrared type sockets and integrating it into my harmony remote activities.

I'm sure my DSPs have had their resistors saved from the dreaded burn out and I've not lost any component to the oft feared in-rush.

No batteries that I'm aware of and in the 15 or so years of doing this, sometimes the kit might be off for weeks on end, nothing lost its config.

I’ve considered this for a while for the 5200, given that they’re only used in the evenings. I have a couple of ikea power sockets for the task.

The problem for me is that I want it to be family friendly, which means they power up ready to go. Unfortunately the standard volume level for our house is 45 but the speakers power up at 65. This means I need to write a script which:
- powers up master speaker
- waits a short while
- powers up the slave speaker
- waits a short while longer
- connects to the 218, selects an input, sets the volume to 45, puts the system into standby

Not difficult but I need to create a 218 driver for Home Assistant or Homebridge (can’t decide which) and my coding brain is a bit rusty, and I don’t currently have a round tuit. However I just got a smart meter installed (not by choice) and it is perfectly designed to change people’s habits…

Hi all

I thought you could reset the starting volume? Sure I did it on my G68/DSP5ks, admittedly a long time ago.

No doubt somebody will agree or not as the case may be, happy to stand corrected.

Cheers

Jon

Would seem a retrograde step if the newer kit can’t have starting volume set when the older kit could do this for years.

IIRC DSP speakers have always defaulted to volume 65 on power-up ... there has been no change in functionality.

[Some?] Meridian processor (and controllers) have a startup volume set in their config.
However, the DSP speakers are not instructed to switch to this volume until the controller comes out of standby.

This normally works fine, unless the speakers are set as controller and used independently of a Meridian processor / controller.

Regards,
Carl

On the 218 you can set the analogue output to a specific level, or you can set the SpeakerLink level but only if it is set up as controller - but it doesn’t have an IR receiver

Close, but no cigar, as so often!

I tell a lie. You can set the SpeakerLink value to a specific value when it comes out of standby, as long as the value is above 25. Unfortunately this only works when the speakers are already powered up. It doesn’t seem to work if they have just been powered up to their default 65.

All very interesting stuff, many thanks for the responses. I have gone ahead with smart plugs on both systems. I just make sure everything is in standby before switching the plugs off.

I have noticed that the 5200s always power up on volume 65, though the AC200 seems to remember the volume it was switched off at, usually around 60 in my setup. As soon as I change the volume on the AC200 (with its mini remote) the 5200s come into line with it so not a problem in my case.

best wishes

john