Meridian 861v8 Reference Digital Surround Processor

$24,999

861V8 Reference Digital Surround Sound Controller

Total Performance and Flexibility

The Meridian 861 sits at the heart of the theatre, linking all of your audio sources such as Blu-ray disc players, at the highest quality. Featuring our patented filter which makes standard resolution sources sound like high-resolution and Meridian Room Correction (MRC), the 861 also adds extensive connectivity including the award-winning Meridian Sooloos. Its modular approach delivers complete isolation between analogue and digital signals for world-leading performance.

Key Features

A reference Sooloos zone delivers pristine lossless audio quality for all your music.

Unique Meridian High Resolution up-sampling offers the best possible performance from all of your sources.

Re-clocking of the digital audio signal removes timing errors for superior clarity and resolution.

Multiple outputs which enable the creation of both passive and DSP based systems from the same Surround Controller.

We are the masters of Digital Signal Processing

Technologies

With its extensive Research and Development programme Meridian has pioneered the development of a host of innovative audio technologies many of which feature in today’s Meridian products.

Meridian Room Correction (MRC)

Room shape, size, furnishing and loudspeaker positions all influence the sound of any system. The result is often uneven sound - low frequencies are too loud in some places and too quiet in others. Meridian's Room Correction system uses powerful DSP to smooth out uneven room resonances for clearer sound and better imaging.

SpeakerLink

Traditional audio systems often require large, expensive cables to maintain their performance. Meridian's SpeakerLink uses an “Ethernet style” cable that delivers pristine digital sound and control down a single cable between Meridian components. The result is simple, unobtrusive, and cost-effective cables that are easy to install.

FIFO Buffering

Each sample of a digital recording must remain evenly spaced in time. Unfortunately, timing can vary, especially when reading discs. This is “jitter”, degrading music's sense of space and diminishing realism. Meridian's multiple “First In, First Out” buffering system minimises jitter, ensuring perfect timing and improved clarity. You enjoy a clearer feeling of the instruments and their interrelationship.

Smart Source

Music, movies and other sources each need their own settings to play correctly. Usually you have to select the right settings yourself. A Meridian system, however, analyses the incoming content and automatically selects the correct group of settings – we call them presets – for the source. You just sit back and enjoy the experience.

Meridian Apodising Filter

Filters are critical in digital audio. Commonly they introduce distortion and harshness because of "pre-ringing". Early digital recordings suffer from harshness too, due to primitive filters. After painstaking research, Meridian developed a special filter that avoids pre-ringing, so it can be steeper, cleaning up the effects of early filters. The result: a better, cleaner sound from recordings old and new.

WE ARE THE PIONEERS OF HI-RES AUDIO

UPSAMPLING

Uses a complex digital filter to double the rate of samples from the source to improve resolution of the finer details in the record. This means that even with a standard source such as CD using our upsampling technology we are able to significantly enhance the listening experience.

MHR [MERIDIAN HIGH RESOLUTION]

A patented Meridian audio format that combines high bandwidth, security and low jitter. MHR gets the highest possible sound quality in playback systems that use Meridian and enables the encoded transmission of PCM, MQA and DSD.

The Science of Emotion

Meridian’s incredible innovations can transport the listener to the emotions of a live performance.

Technical Details

CORE CARDS

The following cards are fitted as standard inside a Meridian 861 Version 8:

IA04: 6x Analogue Stereo Inputs, Phono. Can be configured as 2x six-channel analogue inputs
OE34: 8x Digital Output, SpeakerLink. L, R, C, SUB, Side L, Side R, Rear L, Rear R.
IE44: 6x Digital Audio Inputs, Phono, D1 to D6 can be configured as 2x six-channel digital inputs with Meridian SmartLink performance. 2x Optical Audio Inputs, Toslink. SpeakerLink Input, RJ45. Meridian Multi-channel High Resolution (MMHR) Input, RJ45.
CO00: Control computer card. Complete with Flash memory, RS232 port for control and status, 3x configurable trigger outputs and 2x Meridian Comms.
ID29: Digital Input card with 1x USB input, 3x Optical Audio Inputs, Toslink, 2x SpeakerLink inputs, RJ45.
ID41: Audio endpoint card with 1x Ethernet network, RJ45, enabling highest possible playback performance with Meridian Sooloos.
OA18: Analogue output cards each with 4x analogue outputs, XLR, configurable, with 24-bit, 192kHz DAC (2 cards).

OPTIONAL CARDS

IA04: 6x Analogue Stereo Inputs, Phono. Can be configured as 2x six-channel analogue inputs
OA08 Analogue Output card, with 4x Analogue Outputs, Phono, configurable, with 24-bit, 192kHz DAC