CES 2009 - MERIDIAN + SoolooS

[Still-One]

Originally Posted by tonepub

Ive been a happy Sooloos owner since the beginning! Mine's still not half full. I think about 4500 CD's on it, with room for about 11,000. Who wants to lend me their CD collection?

But the Sooloos is killer. Haven't had a stitch of trouble with it and it worked like a charm when we had the DSP7200's in for review. Great system that doesn't take up much space!


Howie, you've got the 808.2, all you need is to plug the Sooloos into the dig input. It works fantastic together!!!

Jeff

Does the Sooloos allow you to save your discs "bit for bit" as an alternative to FLAC. Also do you know if it is possible to download some of the hi rez files that are currently available to the unit?
Jim

[Tonepub]

No, that is the only weakness of the system.

However, it's not a deal breaker for me. I bought it really as a convenience component, not a source to replace my CD player (Naim CD555/PS55) or SACD player (Wadia 781i SE).

I still use physical media for critical listening and the Sooloos for background, non critical listening. I'm even going to digitize about a thousand of my favorite LP's to put out there. Really helps the fam enjoy music more and when friends come over and the scotch starts flowing, everyone stays the hell away from the equipment rack!

[Tonepub]

Originally Posted by 2uberoller

Isn't the interface on the sooloos pretty much the same as itunes which is free ?

iTunes really falls down with a big collection...

[howiebrou]

Originally Posted by tonepub

Howie, you've got the 808.2, all you need is to plug the Sooloos into the dig input. It works fantastic together!!!

Oh please don't say that! Actually with the DSP speakers you don't even need the cdp .

My 861 has arrived at the dealer so gotta go and pick it up sometime

howie

[Tonepub]

Howie, you'll need your 808.2, because you need the analog input...
And the VPS is a perfect match with that combination, that's what I used when I had it here.

[howiebrou]

Originally Posted by tonepub

Howie, you'll need your 808.2, because you need the analog input...
And the VPS is a perfect match with that combination, that's what I used when I had it here.

You're right. I meant for the sooloos I only need the speakers although I have not yet worked out what and if the appodising filter applies to digital inputs on the 808.2.

BTW, did you compare spdif and speakerlink connections on the dsp7200 to determine if there was any difference sonically?

howie

[Tonepub]

To the best of my knowledge, it does. However if you blast a note to someone at Meridian US they can tell you.

I couldn't hear a diff between speakerlink and SPDIF. Bob Stuart told me that was his goal. And it's really liberating to hook your system up with wire from Home Depot!

It only cost 35 bucks to wire the system!

Also the new Sooloos control that is coming out will have speaker link. Very cool.

[Victor]

I,ve been reading about the Sooloos having the best user interface for years, I think I may be ready to take the plunge and finally get a Sooloos for my system. I do have a few questions though.

Originally Posted by tonepub

Ive been a happy Sooloos owner since the beginning! Mine's still not half full. I think about 4500 CD's on it, with room for about 11,000.

The Meridian web site shows storage of 2400 per twinstore. Do you have 5 twin stores?

Originally Posted by tonepub

I was amused that we wrote the review on it a year before TAS and Stereophile but was flattered that TAS's headline was "I have seen the future of music"...

I just read your review of the Sooloos, thanks for some more good writing. In your review you said if you have 2 twin stores you can set one to be the content and the other to be the backup, if you have only one twin store can you set it to be all content with no backup? Is this how you have so much storage space?

Originally Posted by tonepub

But the Sooloos is killer. Haven't had a stitch of trouble with it and it worked like a charm when we had the DSP7200's in for review. Great system that doesn't take up much space!

On the control 10 can you use the digital output to a DAC and the Meridian speakers link to some Meridian DSP speakers at the same time making the Control 10 a 2 zone controller?

[Tonepub]

Originally Posted by Victor

I,ve been reading about the Sooloos having the best user interface for years, I think I may be ready to take the plunge and finally get a Sooloos for my system. I do have a few questions though.


The Meridian web site shows storage of 2400 per twinstore. Do you have 5 twin stores?

I just read your review of the Sooloos, thanks for some more good writing. In your review you said if you have 2 twin stores you can set one to be the content and the other to be the backup, if you have only one twin store can you set it to be all content with no backup? Is this how you have so much storage space?


On the control 10 can you use the digital output to a DAC and the Meridian speakers link to some Meridian DSP speakers at the same time making the Control 10 a 2 zone controller?

HI Victor, actually I have two of the older Store two's. They each have 2TB of storage and I'm using a Drobo for backup. What you can do (and this is Sooloos approved) is to replace the 1TB drives in a TwinStore with 2tb drives. When you turn it on from cold, it reformats everything. I believe in the next release of the software, you will be able to make a twinstore completely storage or backup.

Im not sure about the two zones on a control 10, you may have to ask Meridian about that...

Also, my collection has grown a lot since the original post, I'm up to 6300 CD's now....

If you do replace the drives in your twin stores, spend a little more money and get "Enterprise Quality" drives. These have a much longer MTBF (Mean time between failure) rating and should last 2-4 times longer than standard drives.

The Big diff between the older Store One and Store Two and the new TwinStore units is the network speed. The old ones like mine are only megabit (100-bt) speed and the TwinStore is gigabit (1000-bt) network speed. The bottom line is that with my drives, 2TB takes about three days to backup and three to restore. With the new drives, you should be able to do a backup in about 6 hours!

Hope that helps a bit. I have to say I really enjoy my Sooloos, especially now that it can hold 24/96 files. I've been slowly digitizing some LP favorites to the Sooloos, making more of my collection accessible. I figure by the time I retire, I'll be able to digitize most of it! (and then need more space!)

[Victor]

Thanks for the info. I did find info on the net about using 2-2TB drives in the Twinstore. If I get the Sooloos I'll probably use the drives that come with the Twinstore to make sure all is working well then put some 2TB drives in after a month or so. If you can put 2-2TB drives in a Twinstore and use it all for storage then the Twinstore could hold 9600 CDs in standard FLAC, this would be fantastic.

I finally talked my local dealer into getting a Sooloos system for me to demo, it should be here next week. I have a feeling once I get this in my system I won't be returning it.