LittelFuses Series 285 AUDIO/MEDICAL Quality

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What NEW properties are discovered that invalidate the old?

We naysayers have all heard audible changes without changing anything.

Claimed changes are all explainable by pedestrian, non-exotic effects. Purveyors and aficionados make extravagant claims without any scientific or engineering support other than their say-so.

The proponents frequent resort to denigrating the naysayers ability to hear in spite of their  decades  of proven ability.

Paul oversimplifies Fast / Slow styles. There are many more types than fat / skinny for any number of specific uses.

40+ years ago in professional recording studios we found that poor quality plating or construction on fuses and holders could have deleterious effects on sound quality. These were truly sh!tty products with bad base metal, poor plating, end cap welds, etc.

BUSS, Littelfuse, Osram, etc. fuses do not suffer these quality defects.

The 285's look like a good solution.

Mr Rubin,

There's a BAZILLION : 1 ratio between the effect of cables and fuses.

Where foolzers go wrong is thinking their system is stable. It is not. It and they change day to day.

It is impossible to shut down a system for the time it takes to change fuses and have it sound identical upon restart.

DO THE MATH!!!

What are your thoughts on Speaker cables or interconnects? Larger diameter cables are better so 2/0 welding wire should be great to use, but they sound like crud. So what is it then?  

Large diameter cables with the same geometry lower R & marginally change L&C. When calculating impedance, L&C are squared terms while R is linear.
see http://www.ielogical.com/Audio/CableSnakeOil.php

I'll bet your entire rig that if you let someone change fuses randomly without your knowledge, you will not detect any change. There are a lot of loonies in the audio field on both sides of the counter.

If the fuses or holders are ChiCom crap, replace them with Buss, Littelfuse, Osram or other reputable makes.

How often have foolzers left their gear connected for a year, decided to try a fuse, unplugged a bunch of connectors and presto the fuse is 'magic'.  If everyone would replug all their cables every few months, they would also transform their systems. If the system has fuses, reseat them as well. Ditto tubes.

I recently helped a fellow repair a tube amp he'd picked up for a song by simply replugging all the tubes a few times. Connectors are crap. Gold or otherwise.

Many speakers have internal push on terminals. Some are less than stellar quality. Pull your speakers apart and solder all internal connections.

Fremer et al. make money reviewing stuff.

Mr Rubin, I was power conditioning in the 70s.

I have a power conditioner. I chose it from 4.

When I moved and changed amplifiers, it made no difference as the amp has excellent filtering capability and my local power is not LA DWP garbage. It’s now a very expensive power strip to control the HT.

Delude yourself as you see fit.

A bigger issue is fast transient signals that exceed the short term capabilities of your amps power supply. This voltage drop in milliseconds adds audible distortion, particularly in a premium system. The combination of a high-quality power conditioner and high-quality power cords noise is to suppress noise.

Nonsense. The line frequency is TOTALLY UNRELATED to program demand. The power supply diodes conduct ONLY at the PEAK of the AC line waveform. The capacitor bank supplies the DC. If the capacitor bank voltage drops below output demand, distortion occurs in the output stage. Input stages have typically have secondary regulators and run at lower voltages than output stages.

A power conditioner may remove some HF noise from the line if there is any. Regardless of noise, it will add impedance to the power transformer / AC line interface. For lower power devices like sources and control units, no biggy. For high current devices, the effect varies with the line and transformer impedances AND THE DEMAND. Take home a few power conditioners and a few amps. The number of combinations is PwrCon X Amps. Some improve, some don’t, some have no effect. Move to another location and the game starts anew.

DO THE MATH!!!

Mr Rubin,

My dear old Nan often counselled "A fool and his money are soon separated"

George, others and I are trying to help you keep yours. As engineers and audiophiles with countless years investigating audio phenomena, we have a pretty good idea on what is buckwheat.

The fuse phenomena, and innumerable other tweaks, are easily explained by connector rejuvenation and other non-Merlinic majic.

Cables are easily explained by reasonably simple math. However, few bother. When perceived performance was less than expected, "burn in" was invented. What is happening likely connector related, outgassing and oxidation. After the prescribed NNN hours, the sound changes. Replug them and start over.

Decades before burn in was discovered, professional electronics and recording engineers were refreshing contacts. Some studios went so far as to solder every possible connection for the absolute degradation minima.

Make a bundle. You'll need it.

Provide details of the experiment - what system did they try it with, including Amp, Pre-amp, source, cable information. What are the variables of your testing?

As mentioned:
 - we found that defective plating or weld/solder affected the sonics
 - we found that reseating fuses just like any other connection affected the sonics
 - we found that soldering fuses just like any other connection affected the sonics
 - we surmised that a nearly blown fuse could negatively affect the sonics, but were never able to conclusively determine

We did not find the fuse brand, geometry or anything else made a difference when using quality fuses and holders.

Foolzers claim improvements readily attributable to not performed pedestrian maintenance issues and which can therefore be discounted for lack of rigor.

Foolzers claim improvements readily attributable uncontrolled environmental issues and which can therefore be discounted for lack of rigor.

BTW, Power Conditioners DO make a difference. NOT always positive.

More that once, I've been seduced only to shortly thereafter determine apres more divers material, "This is crap!"