fuses - the $39 ones or the 85 cent ones


My Rogue Cronus recently blew a slow blow fuse. I was surfing to find a replacement. The stock fuse is a typical metal end cap, glass and "wire" fuse. The audio emporiums only seemed to offer these $39 German gold plated end wunderkinds. I finally found "normal" fuses from a guitar amp site. Has anyone tried the uber fuses and found the sound better? Hard to understand how it could be. Thanks for any thoughts.
joe_in_seattle
Yes, do it now Timrhu!! I used home made wood plinths with brass footers..1" thick and 15"x15" for my subs. My subs also have Mapleshade brass heavyfeet footers attached for even more decoupling and isolation. The results are so impressive that I could swear I had a pair of new $27K wilson 8's or the like ...I did have a pair of the 6's once and the sub elevation has surpassed the bass quality and dynamics of those $20k speakers. The improvement was quite startling across the board; Better slam, improved weight and definition with increased clarity and soundstaging has improved as well. Image specificity and instrument placement are stunning...it seems that proper integration and decoupling of the subs effects more than just low bass response. The ear seems to pick up a better sense of coherence well up into the mid band...remarkable!!
I e/m the engineers at MBL to ask their opinion on upgrading to the HI-FI fuses- they felt that it may cause damage to the units and felt it did nothing to the sound???- they HIGHLY rec. I stay with the regular (cheap) fuses)- bill
Says something about MBL and how highly they trust their customers. Not surprising though..they don't want some nimrod screwin around with their amp and then sending it back for repair!
I don't know much about MBL, but it is obviosuly good gear based on my hearing them at shows. It is interesting to me that when speaking to the folks who make this stuff (I spoke to three who make highly regarded amps)they don't buy the tweeked fuse approach as making any improvement in sound - that has been consistent. The one approach that I do follow, which was recommended by Roger Modjeski of Music Reference/RAM Labs, is to use ceramic, sand-filled fuses - not for sound, but to protect the equipment should a fuse blow and shatter - the ceramic stuff handles that much better than glass. But if you hear improvements, that's great, especially for just $39 which is exorbitant for a fuse, but cheap for any noticeable improvement.