Wasn't gonna post this...

[TheMooN]

I too was somewhat a sceptic until I actually tried ( free of charge ergo no purchaser expectation ) an SR Red on the power input to my ARC Ref preamp, replacing the original factory fuse was laughable.

i now run SR Black's in several locations.

[struth]

Beware people who decry anything they dont understand. . Do understand it and am sceptical myself but others say they do hear improvements, as they do with mains cables which are just another bit of wire. Thus i am open to the idea at least, even if not convinced.

Just my take, so there

[Arkless Electronics]

Hey Jez,

No faith-based purchase or kool-aid drank here, just what my ears tell me.
Nothing to sell here, no dog in the race...just passing on direct experience of listening in my system to folks.

I find it a bit of a puzzler as well, know the theory so its a surprise the level of improvement.
Genuinely interested in what you think of this mate, from an EE's point of view:

Could the use of graphene as the fuse element rather than normal fuse metal have any effect electrically?

Doesn't necessarily follow that its audible of course, but could that affect how the fuse passes current through it before it gets converted to audio signal?
We know how important a good clean power supply is to reproduction, could this be the first part of the chain and its removing a choke point before current flows into the equipment?

Happy to look at any evidence you have to say that the fuse has no direct effect on any electrical property of current flowing through it and entering the equipment.
And what does the fuse do when its between amp and speaker, how does this have an effect?

Ta.

Ok I'll take the bait.. for now.
First of all I don't believe what your ears tell you... I wouldn't believe it if MY ears told me it neither! Impossible is invariant so "maybe it really does have an effect somehow" is not an option. It doesn't.

What a fuse may or may not do to electricity passing through it is irrelevant. It easy to design a power supply (most fuses are obviously in power supplies) in which even if you deliberately fed 10 Volts of the most manky interference etc into the power supply, less than 1PPM would be measurable at the output of the supply. A fuse is in effect a resistor of very low value, say 0.01R, even 10Amps flowing through this will generate only 0.1V across it. By the time the mains voltage has passed through transformer, rectifiers, smoothing caps, probably RC filtration and then usually a voltage regulator, any variations in the output due to the fuse will be less than the random movement of electrons in a piece of wire!

Graphene is the best conductor known but why would you want the best conductor as a resistor? Unless a fuse is a resistor it cannot dissipate power and cannot blow! This kind of messes with the whole point of having a fuse... If it is graphene, the conductor must be incredibly thin, or mixed with other things, to create resistance...

In the case of a speaker fuse, or one at the output of an amplifier and not within the negative feedback loop, the fuse passes the whole AC signal current and if rated low enough to have any chance of blowing and saving the speaker will vary in resistance over each cycle of low frequency and thereby generate distortion, mainly third harmonic in nature.

[Gazjam]

Know a guy over on the Wam who trusts his ears less than what he can measure.
Has actually said it sounds better to him but doesn't want it, as it measures worse!
Different strokes I guess..and thats ok.

Martin,
Literally, only thing I'd changed was the fuse.

Not a believer in foo personally, (gave it up with the green pen on CDs!) but there seemed to be sound scientific reasons for at least the POSSIBILITY of something here with these fuses?
(The hundreds of extremely positive comments and the 30 day trial didn't do any harm either.)

I dont really do Dogma of any kind, so try to keep an open mind but always always need to near things for myself.
i cant explain it rationally either, it just gave my Transporter a huge kick up the arse and I've never heard my digital sound anywhere near as good as this before.

One coming for the preamp too.

Would you trust your own ears, then? I'm as sceptical as you are but if Gaz is saying there is a big difference then I'm inclined to think something is going on. I'd be happier if I knew for certain that he has not changed anything else that may be a more rational reason for an improvement.

The fact is that if the fuse alone affects sound quality all bets are off about pretty much everything and that is just a little bit scary.

[Sovereign]

Thanks for your last comment Jez, I appreciate it when you spell things out and not just bugger off. I helps me on my learning curve mate, cheers.

[Arkless Electronics]

Would you trust your own ears, then? I'm as sceptical as you are but if Gaz is saying there is a big difference then I'm inclined to think something is going on. I'd be happier if I knew for certain that he has not changed anything else that may be a more rational reason for an improvement.

The fact is that if the fuse alone affects sound quality all bets are off about pretty much everything and that is just a little bit scary.

It's a big IF... and I say that even if 1000 people say they hear a huge difference they are still all imagining it and that the power of expectation bias is responsible for SO much of what people "hear" in hi fi..... but yes, all bets would be off about pretty much everything and it would be fucking scary!!!

However, I don't believe for one second that after mankind harnessing the power of electricity for over 150 years, inventing radio, TV, the computers we are using right now, putting man on the moon, the CAT scanner etc etc and all the scientific research that produced all this by some of the best brains ever to exist in the likes of NASA, MIT, Bell Labs, the research depts of companies like Philips, Hitachi, Sony, Lockheed-Martin, BAE etc etc, that there are still matters to do with the simple flow of electricity through a fuse, or mains lead, that have eluded all of mankind's investigative powers for 150 years but which have been discovered by audiophiles...

And on that bombshell... I'll bow out of a certain-to-be-circular argument in which we've "all been there before" Carry on...

[Gazjam]

Good info Jez, but be careful with the name calling eh?

No bait to take mate.
I believe my ears and Im cool with that.
Wouldn't be putting this forward if I didn't know for a fact my kit sounds much better.

Know both sides of the argument, the issue being that measurement only folks come from the viewpoint that everything is understood...your 'impossible is invariant' seems to demonstrate this?

Good scientific method comes down to testing after making a hypothesis, not dismissing things out of hand due to established models of belief.
Fair point?

And as you say its a fuse that uses graphene in its construction, it will have other mechanisms going on.

s'all good.

Ok I'll take the bait.. for now.
First of all I don't believe what your ears tell you... I wouldn't believe it if MY ears told me it neither! Impossible is invariant so "maybe it really does have an effect somehow" is not an option. It doesn't.

What a fuse may or may not do to electricity passing through it is irrelevant. It easy to design a power supply (most fuses are obviously in power supplies) in which even if you deliberately fed 10 Volts of the most manky interference etc into the power supply, less than 1PPM would be measurable at the output of the supply. A fuse is in effect a resistor of very low value, say 0.01R, even 10Amps flowing through this will generate only 0.1V across it. By the time the mains voltage has passed through transformer, rectifiers, smoothing caps, probably RC filtration and then usually a voltage regulator, any variations in the output due to the fuse will be less than the random movement of electrons in a piece of wire!

Graphene is the best conductor known but why would you want the best conductor as a resistor? Unless a fuse is a resistor it cannot dissipate power and cannot blow! This kind of messes with the whole point of having a fuse... If it is graphene, the conductor must be incredibly thin, or mixed with other things, to create resistance...

In the case of a speaker fuse, or one at the output of an amplifier and not within the negative feedback loop, the fuse passes the whole AC signal current and if rated low enough to have any chance of blowing and saving the speaker will vary in resistance over each cycle of low frequency and thereby generate distortion, mainly third harmonic in nature.

[anthonyTD]

Jez,
I too have comented on this in past threads relating to upgrade fuses.
And I agree with most of what you have written here, the only reason a fuse could posibly have any affect over another is due to its resistance, or posible bottle neck affect to large instantaneous current swings.
Now, as you quite rightly stated; a fuse is designed to be the weakest link in the chain, it is meant to go before anything else; ie; tracks, wiring etc.
My own personal findings with these fuses; to have any affect, is; that they cannot be the same rating as a standard like for like fuse, and therefore have lower resistance, which inturn in some equipment would relate similarly to what Alan [Firebottle] was sugesting, ie; removing the fuse all together, and replacing it temporarily with a thick piece of wire, and I am with alan on this, as I am sure it would have the same desired affect.
Unfortunetly though, in both cases, ie; the upgraded fuse, and the piece of wire, the equipment in question would no longer posses the same level of safety, as it had with the original standard fuse fitted [of this I am certain going on past experience]
I have witnessed this first hand, and have seen with my own eyes the damage these types of fuses can cause in certain types of equipment, when they failed to do their job!
Yes, as with many things Audio, I do believe that such things can have a sonic affect, THIS IS THE PART WHERE Jez and I will mostly always disagree, but we are both grown ups, and I am sure we will always have the respect for each other to agree to disagree on such matters.
All I am saying is; be careful where you fit these things, and if they are in bits of kit that you tend to leave on 24/7, my advice would be ; turn the kit off when not in use!

Ok I'll take the bait.. for now.
First of all I don't believe what your ears tell you... I wouldn't believe it if MY ears told me it neither! Impossible is invariant so "maybe it really does have an effect somehow" is not an option. It doesn't.

What a fuse may or may not do to electricity passing through it is irrelevant. It easy to design a power supply (most fuses are obviously in power supplies) in which even if you deliberately fed 10 Volts of the most manky interference etc into the power supply, less than 1PPM would be measurable at the output of the supply. A fuse is in effect a resistor of very low value, say 0.01R, even 10Amps flowing through this will generate only 0.1V across it. By the time the mains voltage has passed through transformer, rectifiers, smoothing caps, probably RC filtration and then usually a voltage regulator, any variations in the output due to the fuse will be less than the random movement of electrons in a piece of wire!

Graphene is the best conductor known but why would you want the best conductor as a resistor? Unless a fuse is a resistor it cannot dissipate power and cannot blow! This kind of messes with the whole point of having a fuse... If it is graphene, the conductor must be incredibly thin, or mixed with other things, to create resistance...

In the case of a speaker fuse, or one at the output of an amplifier and not within the negative feedback loop, the fuse passes the whole AC signal current and if rated low enough to have any chance of blowing and saving the speaker will vary in resistance over each cycle of low frequency and thereby generate distortion, mainly third harmonic in nature.

[narabdela]

"It pays to keep an open mind, but not so open your brains fall out."


— Carl Sagan

[Arkless Electronics]

Good info Jez, but be careful with the name calling eh?

No bait to take mate.
I believe my ears and Im cool with that.
Wouldn't be putting this forward if I didn't know for a fact my kit sounds much better.

Know both sides of the argument, the issue being that measurement only folks come from the viewpoint that everything is understood...your 'impossible is invariant' seems to demonstrate this?

Good scientific method comes down to testing after making a hypothesis, not dismissing things out of hand due to established models of belief.
Fair point?

And as you say its a fuse that uses graphene in its construction, it will have other mechanisms going on.

s'all good.

What name calling? Just in case "audiophool" is considered more than banter I've changed it for ya

My take on subjectivism V measurement is that they are both important but I only "allow" myself a subjective opinion on those matters which are known to, likely to or may cause a difference... IE if something goes against the laws of physics, common sense and all known scientific knowledge I will not even bother considering it... and, yes, nor will I believe it, take it seriously or give it any credence if coming from someone else...

If someone tells me they've found a new species of worm at the bottom of their garden then, whilst I would consider it very unlikely, I would have to concede that it is a possibility and would be willing to go check it out with them. If on the other hand they tell me there are fairies at the bottom of their garden...... or that the world is flat, or the sun revolves around the earth....

I could describe the full path of the mains from switchboard to becoming DC in the amplifier/DAC/whatever, all the crimped connections, the riveted connections between different type of metal, the other fuses in the path, the screw connections, the soldered joints etc etc and then ask "and you really think that 1CM or so of wire in one particular fuse can make a difference?"... but you "believe" and have "faith" that it does so nothing I say will make any difference....

You could try Andrews idea of temporarily soldering a thick piece of wire across the fuse-holder to remove the fuse from the question of course

Would your measurist mate from the wam be Serge by any chance?

And I'm really outta here now before the discussion becomes even more polo shaped

Edit: Several posts since I left mine half completed until I came back for a fag... It may have been Alan's suggestion and not Andrews to rule out the fuse by soldering a wire across it... and as Anthony says (and Happy Birthday mate! ) be very careful when fecking with the mains