I’ve replaced all 5 of the SR BLACK fuses in my system with the new SR BLUE fuses. Cold, out of the box, the BLUE fuses stomped the fully broken-in SR BLACKS in a big way. As good as the SR BLACK fuses were/are, especially in comparison with the SR RED fuses, SR has found another break-through in fuses.
1. Musicality ... The system is totally seamless at this point. Its as if there is no system in the room, only a wall to wall, front to back and floor to ceiling music presentation with true to life tonality from the various instruments.
2. Extension ... I’ve seemed to gain about an octave in low bass response. This has the effect of putting more meat on the bones of the instruments. Highs are very extended, breathing new life into my magic percussion recordings. Vibes, chimes, bells, and triangles positioned in the rear of the orchestra all have improved. I’ve experienced no roll-off of the highs what so ever with the new BLUE fuses. Just a more relaxed natural presentation.
3. Dynamics ... This is a huge improvement over the BLACK fuses. Piano and vibes fans ... this is fantastic.
I have a Japanese audiophile CD of Flamenco music ... the foot stomps on the stage, the hand clapping and the castanets are present like never before. Want to hear natural sounding castanets? Get the BLUE fuses.
4. Mid range ... Ha! Put on your favorite Ben Webster album ... and a pair of adult diapers. Play Chris Connor singing "All About Ronnie," its to die for.
Quick .... someone here HAS to buy this double album. Its a bargain at this price. Audiophile sound, excellent performance by the one and only Chris Connor. Yes, its mono ... but so what? Its so good you won’t miss the stereo effects. If you’re the lucky person who scores this album, please post your results here.
Where the RED fuses took about 20 hours to sound their best, and the BLACK fuses took upwards of 200 hours of total break-in, the BLUE fuses sounded really good right out of the box ... and that’s without doing anything about proper directional positioning. Not that the BLUE fuses don’t need breaking in, they do. The improvement continues through week three. Its a gradual break-in thing where each listening session is better than the last.
Everything I described above continues to break new ground in my system as the fuses continue breaking in. Quite honestly, I find it difficult to tear myself away from the system in order to get things done. Its truly been transformed into a magical music machine. With the expenditure of $150.00 and a 30 day return policy there’s really nothing to lose. In my system, its like upgrading to a better pre amp, amp, CD player or phono stage. Highly recommended.
Kudos to Ted Denney and the entire staff at SR. Amazing stuff, guys. :-)
Frank
PS: If you try the SR BLUE fuses, please post your results here. Seems the naysayers, the Debbie Downers and Negative Nellie’s have hijacked the original RED fuse thread. A pox on their houses and their Pioneer receivers.
wolf_garcia: Excellent question. I'd like to learn more about this myself. Let's hope we get an answer, because I can surely hear differences.
I have a challenge for you. Seek out your local Synergistic Research dealer and ask them to demonstrate fuses or tuning bullets for you. Listen for yourself.
dlcockrum: I won't be using multiple fuses. I plan to optimize one component, my Audio Research Reference 6 preamp, with the best sounding fuse I can find. I will trust my ears to make the decision.
Since Mr. Denney reads this thread, I am simply asking him for an explanation as to how and why his fuses can supposedly transform the tone of a component. What do they do? How can a fuse, which seems like a passive safety item, for example have an influence the HF extension of a system? Seems like a simple question, and although many cable designers, outboard tweak makers (shelves, footers, etc.) amp designers, speaker designers, and many others are glad to explain design decisions, I'm still in the dark about these fuses…enlighten me please.
Try mixing and matching the Blues and the Blacks and see if that doesn't hit the sweet spot. Perhaps try a HiFi Tuning Supreme Cardas Copper fuse in the mix...
FWIW, my Wife, whose opinion I trust when listening to things music prefers the Blue fuse. She says the increased richness, three-dimensionality, and overall musical nature of the Blue fuse outweighs any merits of the Black fuse. This is not quite cause for divorce. Yet. LOL
As like you, folkfreak, I started with a mixture of grey and silver while running some Ayre electronics. The sound was too threadbare with all silver. Now that I'm running Audio Research and D'Agostino electronics, I've moved to all silver bullets.
@imgoodwithtools quick question -- which tuning bullets do you prefer with your Galileo LE speaker cables? If you are running the grey bullets the blacks will probably be a better match as the grey's have less sparkle and HF extension, the combination with the Blue fuse may then be too much. Arguably the silvers are more true to life, but can in many systems sound etched. This was certainly my experience until I dealt with a lot of other noise and vibration issues in my system -- I started off with the grey bullets and then over time moved to the silver. All in all the tonal shifts we are experiencing are all well within the envelope of historic SR products
Now Ted if only you could be consistent in aligning the colors of SR products with the tonal shifts they produce 😇 !
Thank you for your response, Mr. Denney. I highly respect your product, as I am currently running both your Galileo LE speaker cables and AES/EBU digital interconnect. I also have gotten great results from your Black fuse. I have tried your Blue fuse, but as of now, prefer the Black. I hear considerably more air and sparkle around high register piano and cymbals with the Black fuse. I do hear a richer midrange body with the Blue. Is this an anomaly?
imgoodwithtools, Sorry for the confusion. I am taking about the break in process, not the final result. While Black fuses can go from positive to negitive and back again during break in, Blue starts out musical and opens smoothly during the break in process. As to high frequencies, the new Blue fuses have greater HF extension with more air and a larger sound filed than Black after both are fully broken in.
Yours in music, Ted Denney Lead Designer Synergistic Research Inc.
The black fuse sounded dreadful between 15 and 60 hours breaking in. I had to leave my amps on continuously to arrive at 72 hour break in where they sounded great. The blue fuse sounds wonderful now with nearly 20 hours on them. 200 to 300 hours will take several months as I do not intend to leave my big power amps on continuously for weeks. It's good to know that it will get even better in time. My hat's off to SR for making the fuse sound great as soon as it's used at only $20 more.
Ignore the previous commentator. He's got a problem and doesn't belong on this site-nothing positive comes out of his poison pen. A nihilist.
He's talking about during the break in process, not after they’re broken in. He's saying the blues have a smoother break in than the blacks. This aligns with my experience breaking in blacks vs. blues.
I'm curious, Mr. Denney, what do you mean specifically about "wild sonic fluctuations" with the Black fuse? Does that mean that its response varries drastically from one situation to another, or from one component to another? Have you experienced greater high frequency response from the Black fuse vs. the Blue fuse?
A word on Blue fuse break in. While Blue fuses tend to outperform fully broken-in Black fuses straight out of the box, there is still a burn in process and just as with the Black fuses, it takes about 200-to-300 hrs to reach full performance. However unlike Black fuses with their wild sonic fluctuations, and in some systems possible brightness while still breaking in, Blue fuses tend to sound more natural and dimensional throughout a smooth and linear burn-in period. During this time the Blue fuse will open up across all frequencies until timbral linearity occurs some time between 200 and 300 hrs. One other area where the Blue fuse balances out is in its sound-staging which becomes more expansive and layered especially in the mid-range. As with everything else in high resolution audio, good things come to those who wait but straight out of the box the Blue fuse is a total winner.
Yours in music, Ted Denney Lead Designer, Synergistic Research Inc.
@jafreeman , I experienced a similar result with my fuses: having to turn the volume down. The pressure seemed to be too much of a good thing. One thing I hope you avoid (which I didn't) is the questioning of your state of mind. As to your thoughts on maybe returning to 'normal' levels after a time, that was my experience. About a week ago I found myself turning the volume back up to where I used to have it on most recordings. It's been a few months since I swapped fuses so that may give you an idea of how long it may take. YMMV.
I have done a lot of experimenting with fuses a lot has to do with the circuit design some housing heavy Copper traces on the circuit board ,and the acme silver plated fuse holders or other brands made the impact much less no matter what the fuses for the fuse is the bottle neck .Pass labs and a few others Donot use fuses in some of their gear ,just a breaker. I was saying the pricing is getting out of control $150 a fuses, now audio magic $230 bees wax-honey,and I am sure it damps it well, sonicly ? No idea but in a pinch great in Tea. One thing I found multitudes better, a great Power cord ,your source - Digital for example . I seen a demonstration with several well known cords the Verastarr we found had the biggest improvement vs $$ spent. Yes their was a Elrod that was slightly better But at 4x the cost IMO way excessive per return on dollar spent. power cords are another subject entirely .i am just saying a good Hifi tuning supreme fuse is 3x less but spend on a reference power cord it is night and day more of an impact in your digital product better then a double blind test 5 people ,the 6th was doing the demo with both a Meitner, and Lumin -S with outboard PS.
Well, the SR Blues are so dramatic in my Maggie 3.6Rs over the also-impressive SR Blacks, I had to add just one more SR Blue --to the AC main input of my Wadia 861SE, from 2003. The Wadia uses the smaller, 20mm, 250V fuse at 1A. Since I push all values, I put in a 2.5A SR Blue to replace a 2A Black. The effects were immediate: more information in a more deeply-textured presentation. I had to turn down the volume of the REL Strata III subs again, just as when adding the Blacks to the ARC amps' and subs' AC inputs. The increase in low midrange with the SR fuses has required a backing down of the REL roll-offs from 30hz to 28 and now to 26. There has just been too much bass from both the 3.6Rs and the subs together when adding these fuses. Perhaps I can add some bass back as these fuses mature, but for now, the overall balance of sound favors the low and midrange frequencies with more information, which is not to say the highs are suffering--just that they are somewhat overwhelmed, depending on the recording, and I wonder if this is the effect some of you are getting when you say the highs seem rolled off with the SR Blues--time will tell. Regarding the use of isolation transformers and power cell/conditioners in conjunction with fuse upgrades, I also have only heard improvements by using all of these power-improving accessories. Much has been said in many threads about what is gained and what is lost by trying the myriad products out there, but one rule appears constant; according to the product's capability and system requirements, front-end components are best served first, but as Folkfreak describes, the ultimate application is first a 240V/120V transformer service for all components, then other conditioners after that, as desired. In my layman's experience, these fuses are an extension of a solid foundation of pure and plentiful AC power, the medium upon which we are modulating our music signal. What could be a better pursuit than this?
I have all my source and pre-amp components plugged into a Bryston Bit 20 isolation transformer and my amps plugged directly into the same SR Black duplex. Only the amps require fuses. Plugging the amps into the Bryston ruins the sound by depressing the power available (30% decrease in voltage as read by my bias meters) squashing dynamics.and clarity.
In agreement with last two posts. My system is connected through Nordost QRT components and I have heard improvements every time I played with after market fuses.
I've got a CPT Equi=Core 300 Balanced PC plugged into the wall with a High Fidelity MC-0.5 in the same duplex. The CPT feeds a Tara Labs Power Screen. My components are all plugged into that with Cerious GE PCs. The effects of changing the black fuse in my amp for a blue were easily discernible.
@dbarger the effect is completely independent of prior power conditioning. I use a Torus WM 75 BAL with SR QT Romex in wall into Synergistic 12UEF conditioners into a mix of SR and AQ power cords and the introduction of one fuse at any step in the system is quite obvious
The difference in my system was the SR Black was open and airy but at the expense of sounding a little thin and too light. The beeswax seemed to offer more meat on the bones kinda feel while having a more quiet background which seemed to provide better detail without sacrificing some warmth. My system skirts the line of neutrality so sometimes something like a fuse or power cable can tip the scale quite easily.
I may try an SR Blue myself for the fun of it and take advantage of the 30 day trial.
Just curious if you people with a very dramatic difference, if you’re plugging your products directly into the wall, or into a power conditioner? I have my amps and preamps plugged into an Audio Magic Stealth conditioner and the fuse effect is minor ar best. I imagine the effect is greater if plugged directly into a wall, and then of course dependent on the quality of the mains power. Also likely less if aftermarket power cords are used.
I'll be interested to see what you think of the AM beeswax compared to the SR Blue. I switched about a year ago from a SR Black to the beeswax in my amp and dac and much preferred the beeswax.
I'm very surprised at the difference in sound in my system with the SR Bkue vs.the Black. Its Not Subtle. I'm amazed the magnitude of change by just a fuse.
This has my curiosity up. I ordered both a. HiFi Tuning Supreme and an Audio Magic Ultimate Beeswax fuse this morning...
No roll off in the highs here at all. In fact, just the opposite. Very extended and very sweet. Everything makes a difference, so I'm thinking maybe a good combination is the Blue fuses with a compliment of Herbie's tube dampeners.
About three weeks ago, I received my one and only SR Blue fuse to try in an Audio Research Reference 6 preamp. This new fuse would displace my SR Black fuse, should the system sound better with it. I swapped the Blue fuse orientation twice and settled on the position that provided the greater image focus. At that time, my first impression was that the Blue fuse tended to roll off the high frequencies. I decided to investigate more. The Blue fuse probably has about 60 hours of play time on it now.
To make a long story short, my judgement hasn't changed from my first impressions. The Blue fuse, in my system and to my ears, tends to roll off the high frequencies. With this change, the midrange tends to sound slightly richer. The bass does seem slightly more impactful and focused using the Blue vs. the Black.
To try to quantify the extent of the reduction in high frequency energy, I had some experience fine tuning the tweeter level of my Wilson Alexia's by swapping resistors. The reduction of HF seems to be on the order of 1dB using the blue fuse. If I install the resistors that give me 1dB increased tweeter output with the Blue fuse in place, the sound is almost identical to using the Black fuse with the 1dB lesser resistors.
I then compared the sound of my Berkeley Alpha Reference 2 DAC directly driving my amp, vs. the Audio Research with either the Blue or Black fuse. The sound in the high frequencies of the DAC directly driving the amp sounds much closer to the Black fuse, while the Blue sounds muted in the highs.
To put another description in play, I have a headphone rig highlighting Focal Utopia's. Sound in my main system with the Black fuse in place sounds a lot like my headphone rig running Moon Audio Silver Dragon Headphone cable. Sound with the Blue fuse in place sounds much like my headphone rig using Moon Audio Black Dragon cable.
The Blue did not work well at all in my ModWright 9.9 power supply. Lost all sparkle in the highs with a reduction in dynamics in the upper mids compared to the Black.
HiFi Tuning Supreme Copper (Cu) is an amazing fuse as lalitk has stated. Ridiculously good in the MW power supply and better than the Blacks in my Aurender. Higher energy fuse that adds real-life rhythm, pace, and dynamics and moves the soundstage forward without losing depth and layering when used in combination with the Blacks and/or Blues.
The Blues are the clear victor over the Blacks in my SS DAC, pre, and amp. Have not yet tried the HFT Copper there.
I replaced SR Black with SR Blue fuse for digital player and right away notice more.musical more foot tapping.
It is.midrange improvement but dont think highs or lows are.negatively impacted.in my resolving system. Perhaps tad less.bass but gain midrange far greater than slight bass loss and overall enuf bass (and I am bass picky)....perhaps better still after break in but pleased already
To your point, I did find SR blacks lean towards more extension in high’s and low’s. That’s one of the reason I end up splitting my fuse upgrade between SR Blacks and HiFi Supreme Tuning Fuses which, IMHO are the most neutral fuses. Some of you may not agree but with above assessment but with any tweaks, the level of improvements we hear can be quite subjective and component dependent.
Having spend substantial amount of money on fuses recently, I am not quite ready to take a leap towards the Blues. May be in near future..but for now the combination of SR Blacks and HiFi Supremes sounds pretty magical in my Man Cave :-)
Do you find the overall presentation more laidback in all region, normally this is associated with less vocal presence, more open soundstage with more extension in highs and lows.
Thanks for your much appreciated and valued opinion on the different soumding characteristics of the blue fuse.
I have replaced all Blacks with Blues and, as folkfreak predicted, the Blues are not better than the Blacks in some components IME. Can be too laid back in the highs depending on the component, or just that mixing them gives a better overall result. Try replacing one at a time as you are doing, listen, and be objective before deciding on a victor.
The sound of my system has taken a nice step forward in the past couple of days. It would seem the Blue fuse in my amp has fully? broken in. I've ordered another for my CD transport, it'll be here Monday. Only one more needed for my DAC, and then I'll really be singing (the praises of) the Blues 😉
I just added an SR Blue fuse to my Conrad Johnson Classic SE preamp in my secondary system. A Very nice improvement as soon as I added it. I'm sure it will improve with time as others have mentioned. I'm not saying that I'm going to run out and replace my Red or Black fuses but if I should need to replace a fuse it would be with a Blue. Good job oregonpapa...
That Bells Are Ringing CD is equivalent to a hot stamper LP. Robert introduced me to that CD over 15 years ago. It's one of many great Contemporary CDs. The best ones were remastered by Joe Tarantino, the least successful can be attributed to Phil de Lancie, but the latter has done some fine work as well. The worst transfers were the early mono set of the Firehouse Five and two early mono Kid Ory. The LPs smoke those CD transfers. Almost all the Barney Kessel CDs are fantastic, especially with Previn and Manne.
Your analysis of what you heard at 3 hours prompted me to look at my notes. Here is what I jotted down:
At three hours ...
1. Much lower noise floor.. 2. Better bass extention. 3. Improved inner detail - no loss of tonality. 4. Articulation in voices much improved - more human. 6. Excellent tonal balance. 7. Improved dynamics.
Looks like were on the same page with these new Blue fuses.
I went digging through the CD archive this morning for something to play with the morning coffee. I found this gem ... and I have to say, someone here has to jump on this CD. Its just a plain old Red book CD, but man ’O man, is it ever a sonic delight and great music. Its a demo disc.
I found one on Ebay and its just sitting there waiting for your credit card number. At the asking price, its a bargain too:
I have modified 2 computer power supplies to receive upgraded fuses using fuse blocks or fuse clips. The mod has achieved great results for quite a simple mod. It's absolutely worthwhile. See the pics from the thread below.
The first pc uses the Audio Horizons Platinum fuse. The second pc uses the new SR Blue fuse.
I found that after a 1 or 2 hours, they were eminently listenable and certainly relaxed sounding. They're a great addition to my primary sound system. I rarely use my secondary system and still haven't broken in the amp's Black fuse after 25 hours use. I may purchase a Blue fuse just so I don't have to wait any longer.
I found that the Blues shifted into a decidedly "relaxed" mode after 7 days undisturbed. If you judged them before the 7 days, you might consider trying them again.
You must have a verified phone number and physical address in order to post in the Audiogon Forums. Please return to Audiogon.com and complete this step. If you have any questions please contact Support.
