Meridian 218 - MQA - Roon

Audio Gear Talk Meridian Audio
21

:slight_frown: As Sooloos and all other Meridian endpoints are limited to 96k over the network I doubt it, but you never know?

Russ

22

If it did that would certainly be a turn up for the books. But a welcome one.

23

Why stop at 192? Okay, okay, Iā€™m getting ahead of myself :smiley:

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24

Joel

Control pleaseā€¦

Russ

25

Units are shipping, but iā€™ve only seen comments from people on how to connect it.
Anyone here trying one out and willing to share how they sound? :slight_smile:

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26

Installed the 218 today and enjoyed it from the first moment. Seamless integration with Roon and it played 352.8 KHz MQA files, 192 KHz FLAC files, Stereo DSD 256
11.2896Mbit/s and stereo 24BIT/352.8kHz FLAC files (all sourced from http://www.2l.no/hires/index.html?). Amazing little box :slight_smile:

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27

Hi Rene, can you get MQA through the digital input of the 218?

Thanks,
Andrew

28

Thatā€™s a hot topic over at MeridianUnplugged [MQA CDs and connecting players to a 218 via SPDIF]
(http://www.meridianunplugged.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=261673).

I was assuming it was possible (as itā€™s bonkers not to be able to), but itā€™s not looking so good right now ā€¦ more testing evidence is required.

UPDATE see:

29

How do you feed it 192 FLAC and DSD?
USB?
Network Sooloos connection doesnā€™t do that, right?

30

Sorry donā€™t know, I bought some MQA files/albums but I have all my music only in streaming format, no physical discs.

31

The 218 doesnā€™t have a USB input. DSD will have to be converted to PCM by Roon. 192k FLAC will be 192k PCM. The coax SPDIF and SpeakerLink inputs accept 192k PCM. The Sooloos connection is indeed limited to 96k PCM.

32

Bummer, Iā€™ve just bought oneā€¦

33

Iā€™ve just posted in that thread on HH. Iā€™ve tested mine and MQA decoding works on all of the 218ā€™s digital inputs.

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34

Happy days! Cheers VK

35

I bought a Meridian 218 at my local dealer this morning .:sunglasses:

36

First impressions?

37

First impression very nice , it replaces a RPI3 a Schiit Wyrd and an Explorer2.
Sounds better I think , but it stil needs to burn in.
At the moment Iā€™m playing a Cd in an old laserdisc player using the 218 as DAC.

38

I replaced my 818v3 with a 218. Iā€™m running DSP6000s and, honestly, I canā€™t hear a difference on redbook or MQA material. Same with Acourate on or off. With SEs it might be a different story and Iā€™d certainly expect the 818 to trump the 218 in any analogue application.

39

Is the ethernet connection only compatible with Sooloos? For any non-Meridian and non-Sooloos Roon users, will this work as an ethernet input MQA DAC with a simple Roon setup, over ethernet?

40

Donā€™t know the 218, but Roon supports the Sooloos network protocol for all Meridian devices, should cover the 218 too.

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