Meridian's futuristic, lifestyle-friendly hi-fi system
High-end sound that isn't just for audiophiles: Meridian advances the state-of-the-art for lifestyle friendly hi-fi systems.
I attended Meridian Audio's press event in its NYC office last Thursday, and came away impressed with the company's DSP3200 Digital Active Loudspeaker ($6,000 per pair).
The small, stand-mounted speaker was shown with a Sooloos Control 15 music server; the complete system was just a pair of speakers and the server. The elegant Control 15 touch-screen interface can access your collection of CDs and digital audio files, at full lossless quality.
High-end audio systems can be a little intimidating to use and can dominate a room, but the lifestyle-friendly Meridian-Sooloos combination is just the opposite. It's a music system, pure and simple.
Meridian has made internally powered speakers for as long as I can remember (eliminating the need for separate power amplifiers), and it was also the first to make powered speakers with digital inputs and employ Digital Signal Processing (DSP) technologies to enhance performance.
For example, the DSP3200 speaker features a digital crossover system and uses digital signal processing to provide surprisingly deep bass response and a full sound at low, late night listening levels. The processing can also help the speaker accommodate a wide range of room positions--on or in furniture, on floor stands or on wall brackets--while maintaining optimum performance.
The company is based in Cambridgeshire, U.K., where every Meridian Audio product is conceived, engineered, and built.