Zp 24/96

[jgatie]

Squeezebox did the high end unit thing with the Transporter. It was discontinued last year. Supposedly it never sold enough to justify its existence.

[Majik]

Originally Posted by ErikM

So is there a solution? I believe there is. I think Sonos could leverage their existing client base and engineering into a separate higher end system that would do Hi Rez.. why not have a higher end product line up that would address the demands of Hi Rez audio..and the more upscale buyer?

There are well reported rumours that Sonos are looking into Home Theater products. What this means in practice (outside of Sonos), is anyone's guess. Here's mine:

A range of products which incorporate Sonos technology into a Home theatre receiver capability. As wireless is one of Sonos's strengths I would see some options for the speakers to be wireless (perhaps these are linked zones using different channels, similar to paired S5s).

Why am I going off on this tangent? Because a primary requirement for any such product is multichannel support. This alone would make it stand apart from the current stereo platform. If it's going to be different, then putting hires in wouldn't be a stretch. In fact I would say it would be foolish not to. If the platform has the resources to decode multichannel audio, it's certainly capable of decoding hires stereo.

Will it support video? It will probably have to support video switching at least, if not some form of transport (although this would need to be for wired players, wifi isn't capable of supporting streams of HD video with any meaningful reliability). Some form of native video encoding/transport would remove the need to worry about codecs and would provide full support to existing video sources. There's always room for a separate "Google TV" type box which links in for seamless streaming support.

There's also room for compatibility with the current zoneplayers by streaming a stereo/standard-res only version of audio soundtracks to legacy players. The slightly tricky bit could be making the interface between the two as transparent as possible, but the UI for such a device will need to be far richer than the existing UI. My feeling is this can only be supported using a "two-tier" approach where the current Zoneplayers and any new "Home Theatre" devices are mostly independent, but with some functional bridge between them. A simple solution would be to expose the new system's audio channels as a new music source on the existing system's menu, allowing these channels to be streamed (and synced) to the existing zoneplayers, a bit like Internet radio.

I honestly don't think there's room in the range for a player which is only different because of hires capability: it would be practically identical to the current range but wouldn't be fully compatible with existing zoneplayers. I also think it would sell far fewer than you expect.

Originally Posted by jgatie

Squeezebox did the high end unit thing with the Transporter. It was discontinued last year. Supposedly it never sold enough to justify its existence.

This is what I heard too.

Home Theater gives a proper, mainstream, and easily marketable reason to have a new platform which operates in a different way because it is fundamentally addressing a different capability. If such a platform should appear in the future, it would be natural in my view that it would support hires.

This is, of course, all speculation, and any new range is at least a development cycle or two away (probably 18 months to 2 years). I also don't see it completely replacing the current range, at least not for a few years.

Cheers,

Keith

[ErikM]

Actually gatie you're wrong. Logitech just released a new version for $1500.00 because of demand it be brought back. They also listened to their customers that complained about the pretty much worthless Trans-Nav controller on the front panel, they removed it, which brought the price down $500.00 at retail. http://www.logitech.com/en-us/speake...s/devices/7934

Originally Posted by jgatie

Squeezebox did the high end unit thing with the Transporter. It was discontinued last year. Supposedly it never sold enough to justify its existence.

[buzz]

ErikM,

I can't speak about the demand for such a product, but the original was probably priced wrong and offered to the wrong audience. LOGITECH specializes in fairly inexpensive mass audience products. I don't think that the typical LOGITECH customer would appreciate either version of the product. This product needs special handling.

I'm not saying that the product can't be successful, but LOGITECH will need to bring in some specialized marketing talent. The audiophile community requires stroking.

[ErikM]

As I'm sure you know Slim Devices was the original company that developed the SqueezeBox and then later the Transporter. Interestingly Slim Devices was founded fully two years before Sonos was! Anyway Slim Devices was always a tweaky audiophile/ computer geeky type company. Slim Devices actually did a great job marketing and selling the Transporter. In fact when the Transporter was released there was quite a backorder for it. Slim Devices got very successful with the Squeezebox products (including the Transporter) and Logitech offered to buy them for a whole bunch of $$$$ It really was Logitech that didn't quite know what to do with the Transporter since Logitech is really more a mass marketer.. From what I've read on various forums seems that when Logitech sort of stopped building the Transporter the faithful really complained, so Logitech decided to bring it back at a more competitive price by eliminating the pretty much redundant and expensive TransNav control on the front panel.

[wappinghigh]

As the OP, just like to let everyone know I've moved on...

When I'm not listening to music on my best equipment via a new Linn DS, I now stream all by 24 bit files from the DS via line level analog out into my Sonos system through the remainder of the house..

Yeh I know this is then "re converted back to digital"..whatever...

Sure beats down converting them and having 2 different bit copies in my library

I now pretty much only purchase 24 Bit tracks for adding to my collection. I do still listen to new 16 bit music, but I do this via Rhapsody

So enjoy the arguments everyone, but since the company didn't offer me a knew product I wanted to buy, I've simply shopped elsewhere...

Catch ya

Wap

[Majik]

Originally Posted by wappinghigh

When I'm not listening to music on my best equipment via a new Linn DS, I now stream all by 24 bit files from the DS via line level analog out into my Sonos system through the remainder of the house..

That sounds like a good, pragmatic solution to me.

Cheers,

Keith

[IntoTheVoid]

Now that Apple are allegedly looking to provide 24-bit music via iTunes maybe someone at Sonos will finally realise the potential of this format.

[daxie]

Large +1 for me.

It is the only reason I'm not expanding my Sonos-system but will look into other solutions.

It is not only a question of high-end.
I want to have all my music everywhere available (isn't that where Sonos was designed for?).
I will have a high-end streamer for my dedicated listening environment, but for all other places Sonos is perfect.

So please Sonos, add this quickly or lose a customer.

(An otherwise happy S5 owner).

[Dominic McCann]

Originally Posted by daxie

Large +1 for me.

It is the only reason I'm not expanding my Sonos-system but will look into other solutions.

It is not only a question of high-end.
I want to have all my music everywhere available (isn't that where Sonos was designed for?).
I will have a high-end streamer for my dedicated listening environment, but for all other places Sonos is perfect.

So please Sonos, add this quickly or lose a customer.

(An otherwise happy S5 owner).

Good point well made!
If you have bought some hi-res music why should you have to down-sample it to play it on Sonos and keep the hi-res file as a duplicate for playing on other devices?