Ayre CX-7 vs. Meridian G08 ?

Since I am in the market to upgrade I recently listened extensively to the CX-7 at my local dealer (he thought it would give me a sense of the Ayre sound since I'm interested in the new Ayre universal - which he didn't have at the time). The CX-7 was run through a VTL 7.5/Ayre VX-1(?), Goertz cabling and Vandy 5A speakers. To be frank, the sound was thin by comparison to my 588 (BAT/Nirvana/Parsifals). I listened to Hank Mobley, Vasser Clements, Bill Frisell, Oscar Peterson and Dire Straits. I don't mean to say that the sound was bad, it just wasn't nearly as well-defined as my Meridian: bass wasn't as deep or articulate, midrange wasn't as clean - but these characteristics might be the byproduct of system matching, quien sabe? I still intend to give a thorough listen to the new C5XE universal at the end of this month. As always, YMMV.

Peter and Isleander - thanks for your input. As further info, I am currently running an all tube conrad-johnson system (premier 16LS Series 2, premier 12's, into a pair of Maggie 3.5R's). I'm going to listen to both of these units withnin the next two to three weeks - I'll let you know my thoughts.

I owned the Merdian 508.24 and tommorrow I hope to bring home for a trial a Ayre CX7.
I will post my thoughts.

I've tried both in my system and ended up buying the G08. Tonally, the two players are more similar than different. They both sound very natural with a slight bias toward warmth, but the CX-7 is a little warmer than the G08. The main reason I bought the G08 was it has a deeper soundstage and higher resolution than the CX-7. You can hear some low-level things clearly with the G08 that are lost below the noise floor on the CX-7. The G08 is somewhat sensitive to ICs. I've found Kimber KS-1130 to work well in my system (Rowland/Soliloquy 6.5).

Good hunting, CJ. BTW, as Nighthawk points out, Meridian is sensitive to IC/PC/isolation tweaks. Mine is on a Symposium Ultra and Rollerblocks, power running through a Shunyata KCv2, all of which further accentuate its soundstage depth/width. Also, keep in mind the 588/G08 runs $4K retail as opposed to $3K for the CX-7...sometimes you do get what you pay for. FWIW, any change I make in my system will have to produce substantial improvement for me to give up the 588.