Came home from my friend's, well, umm...mansion. He's had the Meridian 808i for over two years now. He also has the DSP8000s and the MHR cables. Frickin' unbelievable! I hooked up my headphone system (all of it) to his 808i and it was just pure sonic heaven. He also has a fine analog system comprised of Linn SONDEK LP12 and some other stuff I forgot to write down. It was really a tossup between two competing by beautiful sounds. He said his 808i was the best CD player he's heard in a long time. He had almost gone pure analog until it came along.
I swear it sounds like live music even moreso with his loudspeakers. Something worth aspiring to in the future. I also got to play with the analog and digital inputs. It's pretty simple: plug, switch to source, and play. He had a Squeezebox 3 Wi-Fi and hooked it up using a TOSLink cable and it was so awesome. We were going through some of his catalog that he was still building on his Apple MacPro and it was such a revelation. Pandora, countless music organized however you wanted, and all at a touch of a button. Plus, the squeezebox could be placed wherever there was a 802.11G signal. I could get into that someday.
The most important sonics that just keep popping out are the panoramic dynamics, balance, reproduction of ambience, PRAT, and resolution with such tonal purity that it is crystalline. This 808i makes CDs sound better than DVD-Audio and SA-CD easily! It is not digital done right or an exceptional fascimilie of analog: it. is. ALIVE! Music has such joy and vivacity that it is simply addicting. Simply incredible.
Got my first paycheck from my new career. 75% goes to savings. It starts here and now. 31 more weeks or faster. I'm going to ask my friend for a copy of the key to his home in the meantime.
I have been in this crazy hobby for about five years now and I thought that I had seen and heard just about enough to sniff through the b u l l s h e i t z in the 'biz. The Meridian 808i smells like a freshly cut red red rose.
