In terms of “Bang for your Buck”, I would try the following Steps in order.

(You mention your “Meridian Dealer”, so my guess is that you have bought a new pair of D8k`s from him locally. For that reason, he should be more than happy to LEND you the equipment mentioned below so that you can listen yourself in YOUR OWN ROOM and with YOUR OWN EARS. I think you should aim to get the Loan equipment for a Long Weekend or even longer, as listening for just a few hours is not enough (IMHO) Any Dealer should allow you to do this, never mind one that you have already spent some serious money with)

You should select 5-10 of your favourite Tracks (i.e. ones you know very well) from different musical genres (e.g. Rock, Folk, Female Vocals, Classical, Opera etc) and listen to them with the various equipment mentioned below IN the the loop and then OUT of the loop. (For what it`s worth, I always find the biggest difference in going Back rather than in moving up, e.g. put in a Centre speaker and then take it back out again, (easily done in Processor DSP Settings))


STEP 1
Install a Meridian G68 / 861 Processor between your Player and the D8k`s. At a minimum, this will give you Meridian Room Correction (MRC) which, depending on how “ideal” your room already is, might make No difference or even a significant difference. In any case, it is worth exploring in your room

Either of the G68 / 861 will give you many Meridian Presets to try and I would strongly recommend that you try Meridian Trifield mode for CD replay, using 3 speakers (see Step 2) across the front (no rear speakers necessary at this stage)


STEP 2
Insert a VERTICAL Meridian Speaker as a Centre speaker between the D8k`s. This will allow you to try Trifield for CD and DVD-A replay. There will be many proponents of Trifield on this Forum, but you should try for yourself to see what you think in your room

In descending order, the single speaker to try in the Centre would be as follows, in decending order

DSP8000: Obvious, given that it`s the exact same speaker as your front L-R and as it is undoubtedly Meridian`s best sounding speaker. The biggest reason is that its Tweeter height is that same as the front pair, a much desired feature when using Trifield

DSP7200 / 7000: As the 7200 is new, you will not be able to try but the Dealer may have a 7000 that he can loan. If you like it, be aware that the 7200 will sound even better when it becomes available

DSP5200: This will be the most likely option that the Dealer will have available to loan. It`s a superb sounding speaker and a good voice match for the D8k`s, even if the Tweeter height would be a good bit lower. It will still give you a good idea of the possibilities of Trifield. If you wanted to push the boat out, the you could try mounting the D5200 on something solid to raise its Tweeter height closer to the D8k

(Obviously, I`m not factoring in any “AV Screen Height” issues when suggesting a Vertical Centre speaker for Music, but it sounds like you are coming from a 2-Channel Analog Music system anyway, so this may not be an issue)


STEP 3
After trying Steps 1 and 2 above, try a Meridian CD / DVD Player in the loop to compare with the Pioneer. Again your ears in your room will be the deciding factor.

One thing I couldn`t recommend highly enough though would be to purchase some DVD-A`s off the Internet before you try any of the above Steps. The 2-Channel 24bit / 96KHz mixes on many of these DVD-A`s is worth trying, (either in Direct 2-Channel or Trifield) There are also quite a few Music DVD-V`s out there with 2-Channel 96/24 mixes on them and again, these are worth hearing on your D8k`s

Make sure that your Dealer gives you a Player that will allow you to try DVD-A`s and DVD-V`s into your D8k`s. These would include 598, G91, G98, 800 DVD, 808 CD.

Good hunting and good listening with your new D8k`s

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