Meridian Ultra DAC Forget finding the perfect balance in audio quality, size, and price. Meridian's new DAC puts its focus solely on the first criteria with zero compromises.

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Meridian isn’t shy about releasing products that make a statement. Well, that’s exactly what the Meridian Ultra DAC does, bringing a state-of-the-art digital-to-analog converter that the outfit is touting to be “full of ground-breaking technologies and world firsts.”

A beastly-sized DAC (seriously, it’s monstrous), it boasts an exhaustive array of performance-enhancing technologies, cramming the best of what modern electronics have to offer. There’s no compromise to lower price or keep the system compact here – the darn thing just wants to bring the highest quality audio into living rooms and that’s exactly what it does.

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The Meridian Ultra is a 384kHz/24-bit dedicated DAC that can play every imaginable recording format, including DXD, DSD64, DSD 128, and MQA, so this thing can handle whatever lossless file you throw its way. Three upsampling filters give you options for improving lower-quality music files, with a dedicated clock card for eliminating the lowest possible jitters. It comes with dual mono DAC Cards, which utilize multiple power supplies and circuit boards for sound isolation and low-noise grounding, as well as MQA’s Hierarchical Converter Technology to increase temporal resolution while reducing noise.

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To ensure quiet operation, it uses a fully-linear power supply for isolation from the AC power, DC-coupled output to avoid degradation, a static LCD, and even non-ferrous construction for the entire front panel. Other features include DSP filer options, a bevy of connections, compatibility with the outfit’s Sooloos music management system, and hand-built construction.

As you can imagine, the Meridian Ultra DAC isn’t cheap, with pricing set at £15,000.

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