Yes, he did like the Icon4, I have spoken with them too! They were very keen to sell me one.
If I were to go down the passive route I might be looking to the Icon4 because of the remote vol. control. I also have a plan to motorise the Townshend Allegri as a retrofit, but is still on the back burner in the interests of a more wife friendly solution.
I am very tempted by the 818, but being such a pricey item my local Meridian dealer doesn’t stock it. He once told me that they have to pay to order in kit specially for demo, so I feel guilty asking. I may contact Meridian direct to see what they can do during this lock down phase, they may be open to being flexible.
I have received favourable responses from direct contact in the past and that even when the HiFi shops are open for business.
I use the Meridian Ultra Dac with network card. It acts like a preamp with about a dozen inputs if you wish. It has both unbalanced and balanced outputs. Also AES Digital inputs, optical, usb, SPDIF, etc. The network card allows streaming from my Nucleus+ and Naim Unity Core. These two feed the Meridian with SPDIF, or HDMI, or USB. As mentioned before, it does use the apodizing reconstruction filter on non encoded material which sounds wonderful. It also does the full MQA Decode. Very Happy.
Yes the 818 is indeed a chunky modular pre amp, and I like the concept, but I’m not so sure about the ultra DAC that Bailyhill has? If it is as described ‘a DAC’ I am guessing that it will simply have a constant output.
Thanks Frenchrooster you are quite correct, I have now had a look through the manual and the ultra DAC seems to have a lot of ‘preamp’ like functions, including vol. tone and balance controls.
Hello Roog–I feed my Krell KSA-80B power amp directly with the Meridian ultra Dac. It does have a volume control and its has a remote to adjust it if you prefer. You can adjust volume on the unit also. It also has many inputs that can be accessed from the remote or the unit. Its a pretty much one box solution for me. I use it for audio from my Naim Unity Core, my Nucleus+, and now from my Dish Satellite TV/LG Projector. Run all them thru my music speakers.—sorry just saw your later post. Did not mean to repost what you already knew. I guess I can enforce what you read in the manual–a very nice manual I must say.
Thank you @bailyhill your feed back is welcome and very helpful. I haden’t realised it was more than just a DAC. I’m sure that I have seen a review in HiFi + I shall have to look through my back catalogue of mags.
They are fairly rare beasts these Meridian boxes, so its good to hear from you :0)
Hello Roog–these are rare beasts for sure. SkyFi Audio, and Fernando Zillow who operates it, specializes in pre owned gear. He happens to have one at the moment for sale. He is located in NYC, but does most business on line. Check his web site–google should bring it up. I have done business with him on several occasions and he is quite knowledgeable and a great fellow. He now has a bricks and mortar store, but its closed for Covid at the moment. He is open for business.
I was in the market for a headphone amp to drive my vintage STAX SRX/SrD-7 Headphones. Looked a lot on line. Researched the Meridian Prime Headphone amp. These Headphones, and particularly the endergizer box (the SRD-7) normally attaches to a power amp terminals, so it requires some drive. Researched the TFL’s, the one tube amps, SET’s etc and found a few that had the output required. Seems the Headphone Market has gone high impedance and high efficiency, so most will not work well. Then at the suggestion of Barry at Meridian who let me know that the Prime would not work well with these heaphones, suggested the Meridian 251, Powered Zone Controller. Its a power amp, has several digital inputs, including a network port, and two power amps. So its pretty much an all in one. It also via the network card, can be a Roon end point, and is MQA enabled. So bouyed by your positive reaction to the 210, and my experience with the Ultra Dac & 218, with a phone call to Sunny’s, a 251 is on the way. Its an experiment, but Head Phones for me is a recreational activity, not looking for AP status. I bought the HP in 1978 when then were the Top of the Line in HP. Going to be fun. This setup allows my main system to go “unmolested” and I believe I can slave it to the main system thru the network, as I do with my 218 zone controller on the M-6 speaker for my wife down in the Great Room.
I will let you know how I get on with the 251.
@frenchrooster, I didn’t realise this thread had been closed – did it get “out of control”? I noticed that a fellow German had a go at this thread, but I thought it had calmed down…