Meridian F80 to buy or not to buy?
 

I have an opportunity to buy a brand new Meridian F80 either in silver or black for 1000 pounds (about US$1,600) which is quite a lot less than MSRP.

What do you guys think. For a one piece DVD/CD/Radio it does sound pretty good!

howie

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This piece has always caught my eye; me I would probably buy it. In red of course. ;)

The B&W zeppelin has good reviews for 1/2 that price; I am sure either one box wonder in either brand will sound similar.

Not to belittle the Zepellin, but the B&W is a VERY different beast and frankly not in the same league I'm afraid. :no:

That is a great price but if you are only going to use it for background, I also agree that you should go with the Zeppelin.

For its price I like the Zeppelin. My only concerns are that you can only play ipods, not cds, no digital inputs (was considering hooking it up to a Sonos system) and no radio.

It is a glorified ipod dock boom box albeit a very nice one. Problem is I already have one, an Altec Lansing one, though obviously another few notches down the sound quality scale!!

You are right the Zeppelin is a nice iPod dock and the Meridian is a poor one but a good radio. The Zeppelin has no digital inputs, but does have an analog input, but I wouldn't play CD"s thru it anyhow. That music is all on an iPod. I have a whole house system that my SonoS is hooked up to, so my wife just uses the Zeppelin with her iPod music when she is working around the house.
Radio, there has not been radio on in my house for at least 15 or 20 years.

Correction, the Zeppelin does accept a digital input. I should have read the manual.

You can connect a second source to Zeppelin
using the AUX socket at the rear, which accepts
both analogue and digital signals. Zeppelin will
automatically know which type it is receiving.
Analogue sources will need a 2-core coaxial
cable terminated at the Zeppelin end by a mini
stereo jack plug, just like the plug used for your
iPod headphones. The plug required at the other
end will depend on the source.
If the source is an early generation iPod, shuffle,
MP3 player, laptop computer or portable CD player,
the output will probably be from a headphone
socket and the same style mini jack will be needed.
If the source has its own volume control, set it to
approximately 75% full scale.
If the source has a line output – a standard
‘stacking’ CD player, for example – you will
probably need two RCA Phono plugs at the source
end. If the source has its own volume control, set it
to approximately 90% full scale.
Sources with an optical digital output use a
fibre-optic cable, sometimes called a TOSLINK™.
The standard TOSLINK™ termination has a stubby,
block-ended shape, but some devices, including
Zeppelin, Apple Macintosh®, Apple TV® and Apple
Airport Express®, use an optical mini jack plug.
These optical mini jacks have the same outline
shape as the analogue version, but have no black
stripes and have a clear tip for the light to pass
through.
Download the Zeppelin Connectivity Guide from
our web site for more information.

Where are you going to put it?

The F80 is more portable with the handle and small size. So you can carry it anywhere around the house with ease.

I would go for F80. It has better media compatibility. Plus, I like the look better.

Actually the F80 has a separate iPod dock that works very well. With it's digital outputs you can even hook it up to a pair of Meridian active speakers! and there is a new Ethernet link adapter for the Meridian speakers soon to be released. Saw it at the factory last week...

My daughter has a Zeppelin in her room and it's very good for what it is, but the F80 is in another league entirely in terms of performance and flexibility. We used to have an F80 in our bedroom, but my wife (our art director) stole it for her office, so a second F80 is on the way soon.

After having an F80 for about a year and a half now, we are still very happy with it! Highly suggested! And we have a very comprehensive review in Issue 12 on page 95...