[Dixter]

@ you gene ... did I see over on the french site where there are 3 of you that have ordered the A16 24 channel upgrade... if so can you tell us what time frame is Giles talking about when he would upgrade the units.... I don't read french and google translate doesn't do the best job... I think the translation was the end of May ??

 

[mrmac]

I contacted MDS to find out about Dirac live’s compatibility on the old and new chipsets. Below is the response.

“Dirac Live was never implemented on the APM-89L--due to insufficient free
MIPs being available for it.

It was implemented for those APM-89-based products offering Dirac Live on a
separate post-processing card, either the MDS DAE-82 or one of the brands'
own design.

APM-110 using the newer TI K2G 1GHz dsp has significantly higher processing
headroom and can accommodate 16+ channels of Dirac Live.”

So there you have it. If the Smyth’s ever implement Dirac live, it won’t work on the old chipsets.

I still haven’t heard back from James regarding the hardware upgrade. Have anyone received any news?

 

[Got the Shakes]

I contacted MDS to find out about Dirac live’s compatibility on the old and new chipsets. Below is the response.

“Dirac Live was never implemented on the APM-89L--due to insufficient free
MIPs being available for it.

It was implemented for those APM-89-based products offering Dirac Live on a
separate post-processing card, either the MDS DAE-82 or one of the brands'
own design.

APM-110 using the newer TI K2G 1GHz dsp has significantly higher processing
headroom and can accommodate 16+ channels of Dirac Live.”

So there you have it. If the Smyth’s ever implement Dirac live, it won’t work on the old chipsets.

I still haven’t heard back from James regarding the hardware upgrade. Have anyone received any news?

Only response I got to the hardware update was that they would contact me at a later time after gauging interest.

 

[sahmen]

^^^No disrespect but exactly whose interests are they supposed to be "gauging."? You would think the only interests that matter, or should, are those of the clientele who have actually purchased an A-16. However, since they're not exactly too busy asking us what our opinions might be about Dirac, or anything else, which is something they could easily do via sending out one or two e-mail surveys, I'm tempted to think that they either do not really care about what their existing clientele's interests are in what's at stake here, or they might just be gauging the interests of some other set of prospective buyers somewhere else, prospective buyers about whom no-one else among the existing clientele (of IS and preorders) knows anything.

One thing I know for sure is that one cannot gauge any interests in the abstract, without actively conducting some kind of research or surveys, and if the Smyths are indeed currently doing any such "gauging," and actually polling some parties for their research data, then it would appear, rather oddly, that our interests in this particular area, are not among their concerns.

At least I know that I have not received any kind of correspondence from the Smyths that is trying to "gauge" my interest in DIRAC, as someone who pre-ordered, and I am pretty sure that I'm not the only one whose opinion or interests have been completely marginalized or ignored by the Smyths as irrelevant. How strange is that?

 

[You Gene]

@ you gene ... did I see over on the french site where there are 3 of you that have ordered the A16 24 channel upgrade... if so can you tell us what time frame is Giles talking about when he would upgrade the units.... I don't read french and google translate doesn't do the best job... I think the translation was the end of May ??

You are right, the translation with google does not make you bilingual unfortunately. I tried with the German site (hifi-forum)...without too much success.

On the French web site (HCFR), they begun a sort of "fun" statistics to see how many people had taken the upgrade with Gilles Gerin. It started on 31st March only and we are 4 to have answered positively but there are certainly more of us. As you might already know, the possibility to upgrade with Gilles is now over since Tuesday 31st March at midnight.

As far as the timing of the upgrade is concerned, please remember that the corona factor is now always an issue on anything said and promised in the past on any subject.
Now, what was said in the past regarding the timing :
- the trip to the Smyth by Gilles (for training purposes) has been cancelled on March 15th
- the return of the repackaged A16 with new hardware (once received by Gilles) was supposed to take no more than a week before shipping it back
- the deal with the Smyth was that they would send the new hardware to Gilles in one shot only in MAY 2020
- there was also the possibility for us to go to Paris and hand the A16 over to Gilles in person, but now...
- Gilles said on 15th March : quote..."Ah, of course, given the circumstances, you will understand that my trip to Smyth Research scheduled for this week is naturally postponed. Nevertheless, I am hopeful of finding a date by May. Or else, it is really that all of this will have become very, very secondary"...unquote

If
- if Gilles receives the promised hardware in May from the Smyth
- if Gilles goes for training in May , the upgrade would be around June 2020 ? But May is next month. You might as well forget this tentative timeline.

You know now almost as much as I do, i.e. nothing at all. I mean forget the past and wait for news on a daily basis. Anything is possible.
I forgot : stay positive, try to keep sane, be safe and do not go crazy because the Realiser needs you !

PS : another quote from Gilles ...Okay, otherwise, as you know, the upgrade offer ends tonight. Then, we will have to see directly with Smyth Research, if they will take care of it...

 

[Got the Shakes]

^^^No disrespect but exactly whose interest are they supposed to be "gauging."? You would think the only interest that matters or should are those of the clientele who have actually purchased an A-16. However, since they're not exactly too busy asking us what our opinion might be about Dirac, or anything else, which is something they could easily do via sending out one or two e-mail surveys, I'm tempted to think that they either do not really care about what their existing clientele's interests are in what's at stake here, or they might just be gauging the interest of some other set or prospective or actual clientele somewhere else about which or whom no-one else among the existing clientele (of IS and preorders) know anything about. One thing I know for sure is that one cannot gauge any interest in the abstract, without actively conducting some kind of research or surveys, and if the Smyths are indeed currently such "gauging," and actually polling some parties for their research data, then it would appear, rather oddly, that our interests in this particular area, are not among their concerns. At least I know that I have not received any kind of correspondence from Smyth that is trying to "gauge" my interest in DIRAC as someone who pre-ordered, and I am pretty sure that I'm not the only one whose opinion or interests have been completely marginalized or ignored by the Smyths as irrelevant. Now strange is that?

No I don’t think they should be taking the approach of gauging insurers for the possibility of offer the hardware update to existing owners. For all anyone knows most of the current A16 owners have no idea that there is new hardware. I can tell you that after I had my A16 delivered I haven’t received any emails with updates as I had been previously.

They mention charging about $500 for the full upgrade. That seems like easy money to me. I’m not sure why they didn’t commit to offering the service in the future and if only five people partake then that’s still positive cash flow in for them. Would have been easy enough to say they’ll offer the upgrade in limited time window with will be announced as they’re closer to wrapping up shipments to KS and pre-order customers. The fact they they are so noncommittal has me a bit worried. Although I should be used to it by now as it’s kind of par for the course with the way they handle things and communicate.

 

[Dixter]

You are right, the translation with google does not make you bilingual unfortunately. I tried with the German site (hifi-forum)...without too much success.

On the French web site (HCFR), they begun a sort of "fun" statistics to see how many people had taken the upgrade with Gilles Gerin. It started on 31st March only and we are 4 to have answered positively but there are certainly more of us. As you might already know, the possibility to upgrade with Gilles is now over since Tuesday 31st March at midnight.

As far as the timing of the upgrade is concerned, please remember that the corona factor is now always an issue on anything said and promised in the past on any subject.
Now, what was said in the past regarding the timing :
- the trip to the Smyth by Gilles (for training purposes) has been cancelled on March 15th
- the return of the repackaged A16 with new hardware (once received by Gilles) was supposed to take no more than a week before shipping it back
- the deal with the Smyth was that they would send the new hardware to Gilles in one shot only in MAY 2020
- there was also the possibility for us to go to Paris and hand the A16 over to Gilles in person, but now...
- Gilles said on 15th March : quote..."Ah, of course, given the circumstances, you will understand that my trip to Smyth Research scheduled for this week is naturally postponed. Nevertheless, I am hopeful of finding a date by May. Or else, it is really that all of this will have become very, very secondary"...unquote

If
- if Gilles receives the promised hardware in May from the Smyth
- if Gilles goes for training in May , the upgrade would be around June 2020 ? But May is next month. You might as well forget this tentative timeline.

You know now almost as much as I do, i.e. nothing at all. I mean forget the past and wait for news on a daily basis. Anything is possible.
I forgot : stay positive, try to keep sane, be safe and do not go crazy because the Realiser needs you !

PS : another quote from Gilles ...Okay, otherwise, as you know, the upgrade offer ends tonight. Then, we will have to see directly with Smyth Research, if they will take care of it...

Thanks @You Gene.... more info than I thought about.... excellent post... take care you yourself and family members..

 

[Fox1977]

They mention charging about $500 for the full upgrade. That seems like easy money to me.

Does someone know how much the two MDS cards cost ?

 

[Dixter]

No I don’t think they should be taking the approach of gauging insurers for the possibility of offer the hardware update to existing owners. For all anyone knows most of the current A16 owners have no idea that there is new hardware. I can tell you that after I had my A16 delivered I haven’t received any emails with updates as I had been previously.

They mention charging about $500 for the full upgrade. That seems like easy money to me. I’m not sure why they didn’t commit to offering the service in the future and if only five people partake then that’s still positive cash flow in for them. Would have been easy enough to say they’ll offer the upgrade in limited time window with will be announced as they’re closer to wrapping up shipments to KS and pre-order customers. The fact they they are so noncommittal has me a bit worried. Although I should be used to it by now as it’s kind of par for the course with the way they handle things and communicate.

I'm only guessing on this but perhaps they needed to purchase more hardware (boards) to complete the original project and MDS notified them that the hardware they were trying to order to finish the project were behind a revision or more.... so they most likely got in a sample or two of the new boards to determine fit, form and function... once they determined the new hardware was going to work in the scheme of things they had to make a decision on how to complete the original project and at the same time work in the new boards... MDS told them pricing and most likely offered a discount price on a quantity basis... so they reached out to us to see just how many boards they would need to order... I'd almost like for them to just offer the new hardware at the same price of the original kickstarter price... and I'd just buy a 24 channel version... I would think at some point in time if they have some hardware in place that supports 24 channels they would update the whole package so it has 24 channel input/output... as it is now, it supports 24 channel atmos (HDMI) but still has 16 channel input/output connections...

 

[Takeanidea]

I'm trying to get a refund on my A16 and have emailed James twice with no response. Anyone heard anything in the last fortnight from them ?

 

[VandyMan]

I'm trying to get a refund on my A16 and have emailed James twice with no response. Anyone heard anything in the last fortnight from them ?

Yes, I have received emails from James. Not to excuse the lack of a reply, but I think they are busy trying to get the revised A-16 shipping again and probably short staffed too.

 

[J.Villain]

I'm trying to get a refund on my A16 and have emailed James twice with no response. Anyone heard anything in the last fortnight from them ?

I tried the same thing a few months ago and got no response.

 

[You Gene]

I wanted to pay a visit to good old Stephen in Bangor for a little chat. I looked at the registered address of Smyth Research Limited (17 Grays Hill, Bangor, BT20 3BB) on google map and found his little cozy love nest ; a bit frugal yes but with the fixed costs well under control
His office address is at the offices of his accountant. If you look carefully, on the nameplate is indicated :
DN Robinson LTD
Chartered Accountant
with a barber shop on the ground floor !

 

[sander99]

17 Grays Hill, Bangor, BT20 3BB

I didn't know that address.

But this one (used to be on the Smyth Research website under 'contact' before the site got a makeover) :
Smyth Research Ltd., Enterprise House, 4 Balloo Ave, Bangor
There is not much to see there on google maps at this address though, looks like an area with several companies sharing the same address or somethink like that(?).

And with google also this address came up, but there is not much to see there either:
Smyth Research LLC, Balloo Rd, Bangor BT19 7QT, UK

 

[Juy777]

are we stalking them now?