The Synergistic Research fuses arrived yesterday (but UPS put them in the garage. It's only 20 degrees out, so that shouldn't affect them much, right?? :-(
I put one SR fuse in, replacing a HiFi Supreme fuse (with the WA Quantum fuse on it). I heard differences, but, having had no experience with the SR, I neither responded to the change, nor rejected it. It just didn't change the sound so I could tell.
An hour ago, I put the other SR into the system, this one with the WA Quantum fuse chip on it (and it sticks far better than the HiFi Supreme fuses. Who knew?!), so now both SR fuses have the WA Quantum fuse chip on them, and the fuses are in my Hurricane amps (which show ANY change in the system - unfortunately, because sometimes, I don't like what I hear, but then...dark though they are, they are certainly capable of revealing upstream changes).
This was pretty eye-opening. I was even reading an old issue of TAS when the first notes of Vaughan Williams Sea Symphony blasted into the room. And I DO mean, "blasted." It seemed as thought the system was turbo-charged. So, thought I, must be a trumped up midbass-to-lower-midrange effect. Nope. The upper midrange is equally powerful.
Of course, I may be wrong, but the SRs with the WA Quantum chips are a better combination than sticking the HiFi Supremes with WA Quantum chips. I immediately noticed the inner detail on oboes, male voice is more vivid (baritone) and the soundstage seems closer. Bass is unquestionably more forceful, and interesting, because I sold my Arcam FMJ 23 CD player, but still have the FMJ DVD 27 (which I like less: something about the Ring DAC is just astounding in a way that the Wolfson 8740s (or what model it is) are not. The Wolfson's are a bit hard-sounding and I wasn't like the bass, despite the fact that one of the other TAS reviewers said it had great "brute force." I sure didn't hear it. Well, not until I put in the SR fuses with the Quantum chips. Now I hear it. Now, given that the fuses are in the Hurricanes (which always had extremely powerful midbass, part of what made the image solidity so spectacular to my non-audiophile opera singer former boyfriend), it would seem to be saying that the HiFi Supremes weren't great in the bass, and it WAS something I'd noticed before, but blamed it on the new CJ preamp I had gotten. I thought the CJ just didn't have cojones, but now I see that the HiFi Supremes are responsible for the lightness in the bass, and the lack of soliditt of image. Now, before anyone protests that THEIR HiFi fuses have great image density, very few amps have the solidity of the Hurricanes, and I've had - and reviewed many amps for mags. The Hurricanes allow/project exceedingly solid images, which contributes to that realism HP so loved about them, so this is a matter of the rest of the system as well as the amps. All I can say is the HiFi Supremes remove some mid-bass power, because it's back there in spades as of the second I put that second SR fuse w/WA fuse chip into the amp and turned it on. I purposely ignored the sound, knowing I'd pick up some elements of impreovement immediately, without "trying" to hear them. The noise floor is lower, so the soundstage has a blacker background, which means instruments stand out in bas relief more easily. The one part of the frequency range that hasn't improved (yet)is the treble, but I'll let it sit overnight and listen again in the morning (it's 12:40 a.m. Friday morning, Feb. 22, EST).
I'm impressed and I was prepared to just have a good time experimenting with them for 30 days and then - back to the retailer(meaning, I expected the HiFi Supremes to make mincemeat of them, even though I DO have an SR outlet as well).
Hunh, the joke's on me - so far.
I think I wanna keep 'em, Lucy. I know: I promised I wouldn't have any more affairs with new pieces...of equipment. But I can' help myself, honey. Just this once? Please? Please, honey? You know you're the only woman for me, but those quantum electron thingies...MAMMA MIA!!!!! |
Harry Pearson, although not stating whether or not he has tried other fuses, states on his website, hpsoundings.com, that he uses the HiFi Supreme fuses. Of course, this doesn't mean he's heard the Synergistic Research or the AMRs. I bought a couple of the Synergistic Research fuses, but got the wrong sizes, so I have to send them back and exchange them for the smaller, slow blow, 10 amp size. I have the WA Quantum chips on my HiFi Supremes right now, but since I've already paid for the SRs, and they have a 30-day trial period, I see no disadvantage in trying them.
I do wish HiFi Tuning allowed a "test drive," but they do not, even if one ordered the wrong size/fast blow instead of slow blow, etc. I've had my HiFi Supremes for a year, so it should be easy to hear the difference between them and the SR fuses. |
P.S. The small HiFi Tuning Supreme fuses are 58.95. The large ones are $84.95, same price as the Synergistic Research models. Clearly, it's a race! I got mine thru Revolution Power, which also have the Furutech and IsoClean lines. |
Tbg:
Thanks! You are my new (audio) hero!
I'll try turning the SRs around after a few days of listening to them. I just came out of the listening room, and chose Rick James' Greatest Hits. The CD looks as thin as a size 0 model on a runway, but the sonics are rather decent in terms of the body (density) of voice, as well as placement. Also, the background is less hazy, meaning less distortion in the sound, so you can hear hard consonants as well as - and much more important in what used to be called "soul" music, the actual soulfulness of the singers both lead and background. The HiFi Tuning fuses seem to denude voices of their natural passion, making them sound more precise, the way an opera singer would sing it (and I LOVE opera), but not the way a Black singer in the 60s or 70s would sing it: raw, without worrying about the "notes" themselves. Black music is very raw: I sang in the church and, while we paid attention to the notes, it was about "giving it up to God." You can't do that and sound all prim and proper: you gotta "let it GO!" And that's the difference between the HiFi and the Synergistic. Disclosure here: I have have a negative bias against Synergistic. Nothing they've done to me, or any impoliteness on the phone. It's just that they've seemed the Johnny-come-lately, riding on the coattails of others. When they introduced their Galileo line, I was downright disgusted: 14K for an interconnect. And naturally, Nordost could now say, See, we weren't the first to introduce an absurdly-priced interconnect - but now we can do it without looking greedy. So, by assocation, Synergistic entered my world of Sachs, Goldman et al. And this at a time when the economy of the world was in its death thralls. I give you this background, because, let me tell you, if this fuse wasn't "working the show," I woulda been on this site sending them straight to hell...
Five minutes later...
Hell no, MAN. DA-YUM! This is more like Heaven. Black music has all its passion and fire.Aretha opens her mouth and out comes the voice of GOD HIMSELF. So far, the Synergistics are in the lead - and not by a length. But wait! THERE'S MORE!
I got ahold of Darren of AMR and ordered 3 fuses: two for the Hurricanes and one for the PS Audio Power Plant (which currently has a HiFi Supreme fuse in it, so now I'm wondering if THAT'S why the bass still sounds good - but not powerful (the Hales, discontinuous as they are around 250 Hz, have air around the bass instruments and go down to 37Hz before they start having resonances and a bit of blur. Otherwise, they're great (Ken Stevens of Convergent agrees). And they have POWER. So, a huge drum strike, and my 13' x 30' x 9' room shakes. I'm used to that, but more so with the First Sound preamp, which has booty to spare in the bass frequencies, whether Mk I or Mk II (and presumably, MK III).
Back to the AMRs: They'll arrive in 3 days, since I'm in CT, and Darren's company is in Georgia. Even by the post office, that's 3 days tops.
I'm happy and bummed. Bummed?!?! Why would I be bummed? Well, I looked at when I first bought the HiFi fuses. My first batch was December 2011. That means that the problem with the bass (which also affects image solidity) was not a product of the Arcam FMJ 23 (which I used on every type of isolation known to man: Goldmnd Cones, Bright Star, Townsend and thats just the beginning) and I just thought it didn't have the usual 3-D presentation I know it should have. I mean, I heard it in Tom McFawl's room (the Meow-Meow cat commercial jingle writer), which is 33 x 47 and when I came out of the state of shock I was in, I thought, "So, THIS is what this CD player sounds like!" It was alive in a way you wouldn't have believed unless you heard it. The musicians on the recording were sawing away at their instruments as thought someone had said, LITERALLY, you BETTER deliver or you're going home in a body bad. The dynamic kick was astounding. But even in my basement (23 x 40), it wasn't that alive, although it had a realism that surpassed anything I'd had up until then - and I'd had some REAL expensive stuff when I lived in San Francisco. Like the Versa Dynamics 2.3 turntable, for starters.
Anyway, the SRs restore that "life" to the sound, and it's not only on loud music. On some of the ballads on Rick James CD, you can hear him all but begging for this woman to forgive him. The anguish is clear, the softness of the anguish (the pleading please-please-PLEASE-don't-go-ness) is heartbreaking. In other words, the soul is in the music, and above all other parameter that move me to tears, the soul of the music take precedence. But in order for that to happen, the timing must be right (all the hesitations in the singer's voice so they sound frightened, angry, bitter, uncertain, powerful, etc) and the accompanying mood must be right. If the bass slams, great. The treble tinkles? Fly me to Heaven. But if the soul is gone, it's just sound, and this is something not metioned that much in forums. People want "warmth," "better bass," etc. But that's not about music, that's about sound. I'd have to say, unless it's German Lieder, which could never be called "warm," one wants the feeling of the culture producing the music, whatever that culture is (Indian, Chinese, Indonesian). The music should NOT sound American-ized just so we can relate.
I could be wrong, but so far the SRs are doing it. Next up? The African Drummers and then Japanese Gagaku-type music, which stresses breath instead of mathematic intervals.
Whichever fuse does all 3 the best wins the Race! And I'm using only 3 fuses: one for each Hurricane and one for the PS Audio Power Plant. Even Steven, I say.
Let the Fuse Wars Begin!!!
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Thanks for the insight, Lacee. I believe that, different though all of our systems are, some things have traits that are inherent in the design. A mini-monitor, for example, will have, of necessity, a lack of lower bass, and nothing can put that back into it. It's not wrong in any way, it just can't reproduce the "authority" of a low bass sound. Law of physics and all that.
I can't wait for the 5 amp fuses that go into the PS Audio Power Plant. Just changing that one fuse should immediately let me know if, indeed the HiFi Tuning devices denude the system of bass, which, again, i hadn't noticed, but mostly due to the several changes that happened in my system at once. Given how strongly the SR fuses (with, again, WA Quantum chips on the fuses) make the presentation come to life, I could no longer say that the Arcam DVD 27 is "hard"-sounding, although it doesn't match the Ring DAC in the '23 model, as well as the delicacy. But this isn't about components.
I will have the AMRs by the end of the week Friday, and I will be absolutely fascinated to see how the sound - and music - changes. But I could survive on the SR fuses, damn it. I mean, I sure didn't want to spend $133 just 14 months after having discovered the HiFi Supremes, but that's what I'm doing. And if the AMRs are even better, well, this will once again be a hobby that doesn't require deep pockets to get significant improvements! And for that alone, I will be grateful! |
Tbg:
My AMR fuses just arrived.
As a matter of keeping it a controlled experiment, I changed ONLY the fuse in the PS Audio Power Plant 300 (which,for the past year, has had a 5 amp, slow-blow, HiFi Tuning gold fuse in it). I wanted to hear only the change in the the preamp and CD player, which are both hooked into it (the Power Plant).
Quite a revelation for a cold fuse: I played the Katchaturian ballet (the full ballet on RCA Red Seal) and in the opening number, the cymbal crash, which splintered every time it played, held together from initial transient thru to decay. The placement of instruments - and, as mentioned by someone else - their "body" (physical density) is considerably improved so that, while I cannot see the trumpets "side by side" as I have other systems in the past, I can hear the harmonics of several separate ones in the section, so there is more separation and individuation of instruments. And not merely instruments within one group: instruments with different tonalities and timbres (flute, piccolo, oboe, violins, triangles) playing all at the same time, exhibit their individual tonalities, so the music makes more sense, as you can hear more of the composition instead of a mildly blurred - no, make that homogenous - chorus of sound. It's quite involving.
I have one WA Quantum fuse chip left, which I will put on the AMR, but not for until Saturday, after I've had some time to listen to different CDS and types of music.
That said, the AMR made the HiFi gold 5 amp fuse that has been in the Power Plant for the last year sound confused, jangly and even "lean." It was very interesting to hear the placement of instruments, as well as the air gently expanding around them, which, it would seem to me, indicates a coherence from midbass thru, at the very least, the lower treble. (My Hurricanes are not the most extended amps at the frequency extremes, but when I put in the 10 amp fuses I bought - which will replace the Synergistic Research SR 20s - it should be a VERY interesting experiment! |
Well, perhaps more time is needed, but the AMR fuses did not come through on the amps as the fuse did in the PS Audio Power Plant. The sound is a bit cloudy, with a definite rolling off around 4k. Very much the opposite of bright: dull.
Which of you with experience with the AMRs has some idea if there's a break-in time with these fuses. The Synergistics - much as I hate to admit it - have been the best so far, but I haven not put the WA Quantums on the AMR. Even so, the AMRs have had around 10 hours and on Peer Gynt, cut 4, the triangle is so muted, I can barely tell it's there - except that I know it IS there. I turned off the amps, pulled out the AMRs, put the Synergistics back in and, while not in their full glory ( a function, perhaps of the CJ Classic preamp, which I suspect has slightly laid back highs, similar to the ET2 [ but I must state, I don't absolutely KNOW this: I've just NOTICED this since I've had it]), they are audible.
Do the AMRs have some kind of extended break-in time? And yes, before you asked, I've turned them both ways. |
Oh, Phooey!
The last Synergistic Research fuse arrived, and I replaced the AMR fuse in the PS Audio Power Plant. So, now both the Hurricanes and the Power Plant ALL have SRs in them. By the way, I have 3 of each: 3 SRs, 3 HiFi Supreme Tuning Fuses, and 3 AMRs. So, no room for mismatching. I don't like sloppy experiments.
Sans the WA Quantum fuse chip, the sound is unquestionably better at front-to-back depth, not to mention lyrical ability (that means, the ability to make sad music SOUND sad, and fierce music sound FIERCE and romantic music sound...well, you get the point). AND, the amps are still cold! (In fact, the PS Audio always sounds better after it's been turned on (not THAT kind of turned on, horndogs!) 3 hours , and I purposely turned EVERYthing off last night, as I saw the delivery date for the SR fuse, so that I'd have an immediate impression of the SR fuse. If it didn't knock me out on liftoff (power up the photon torpedos, Scotty!), then I could still wait 3 hours for the PS Audio to warm up. But it didn't take more than a few measures to hear, on Peer Gynt (not a good CD, either: a bit etched on brass and strings), the "etch" but more clearly "etched" - meaning, minus the distortion around the instruments - in space. In other words, the actual space around instruments is more easily heard and there is a bit more of a 3D sound to the instruments themselves, with more power in the midbass-to-lower midrange frequencies, consequently more "thrust" to powerful passages. In less wordy terms, the distortion in the soundstage is lower and therefore, cleaner. Less distortion = more music.
Then I put on the WA Quantum fuse chip. Nope, it didn't change the sound dramatically - but it did sound better (and the system's still ice cold and I turned EVERYTHING off when I pulled the fuseholder out of the Power Plant to put the WA Quantum fuse chip on the SR fuse, so it's not as though SOME of the system could have warmed up to make me imagine it sounded better. I left it off for 5 minutes before powering it on, because it had only been on for 5 minutes when I put the SR in the first time).
I'll give the AMRs more time to break in, but I'd have to say, despite my not being a Synergistic Research fan (just can't cotton to the pricing on the super-priced cables, but then neither can I stand anyone else who makes $20K interconnects: the markup is exTREME on those things, and I've been in the business for a while. Maybe the R&D involved, but c'mon...), the fuses deliver.
And I'm not pushing them, but really, how come they're the only ones with a 30-day guarantee on them? Confidence breeds assurance. They really ARE as good as they say. |
I'll see how the music sounds in 4 hours, but for now, I'm off to see The Wizard....um, I mean, Oz The Great and Powerful. And woe to those who get in my way! |
