Fuses that matter.

05-12-12: Bryoncunningham
There's a guy over on the Polk Audio forum who claimed his measurements corroborated both that fuses measure differently and that even fuse directions measure differently. You can see his measurements here. I don't really know what to make of it. What do you think?

Hi Bryon,

Thanks for providing the reference, which I have read through.

Looking at the larger spectral components, which are the harmonics of 60 Hz (i.e., 120, 180, 240, 300 Hz etc.) and the DC component, in most of the comparisons between different fuses and different orientations there is essentially no change. In a few cases there are some minor differences, with the expensive fuses being slightly better in some cases and slightly worse in others, compared to the stock fuses.

The most notable differences occur for non-harmonic frequency components that are at levels of 60 or 65 db or so below the amplitude of the 60 Hz component. Those differences were generally in the direction of favoring the expensive fuses, but in some cases favored the stock fuses. But consider that 60 db corresponds to 0.1% in terms of voltage, and 0.0001% in terms of power. And along the lines of Roger's comment, those percentages will be GREATLY reduced by rectification, filtering, and in the case of many components voltage regulation, that occurs in the circuitry between the output side of the fuse and the signal path.

I would add that the differences in those low level spectral components were so small and at such low levels that I wouldn't be surprised if they were attributable to things like differences in the amount of current being drawn through the fuses as a result of differences in the warmup state of the component, or differences in the positioning or orientation of the scope probe or its cable for each of the measurements.

Mapman, thanks very much. Putting aside considerations of the specific individuals being discussed, your comment that

There is such a thing as "technical intuition". This is what enables one to assess technical facts and draw conclusions that have a good chance of being accurate.

strikes me as perceptive and accurate.

Best,
-- Al

Geoff,

Yes I do have a technical background. A big part of my occupation is assessing technology and managing technical risks.

What I call technical intuition may be similar to what Al calls common sense, at least in the context of technology and science.

It requires knowledge in order to be able to assess the validity of what is believed to be fact. Science and statistics is the still the tool that would best be applied to quantitatively determine support for any hypothesis, but patterns are detected and applied by knowledgeable and clear thinking humans in real time all the time. If the person is truly good at determining patterns among facts as opposed to non-facts and identifying the meaningful patterns, they develop good intuition or "common sense" over time.

Regardless of the domain over which common sense or intuition develops, the common ingredients are the ability to judge fact from non fact in that particular domain of knowledge and the ability to apply logic and patterns effectively to make meaningful associations.

Mapman, I don't know where you got this information, but it is not science.

There are people that believe you need science, and Electrical Engineers to make things happen in audio.

Then you have people that sell tweaks that just don't have any scientific backing.

It appears that some of these people want you to believe in science fiction. Some of them would be happy if you didn't do any scientific investigating about their products. When someone finds out there is no backing to these products, it seems make these people nervous.

Then in their defense for people not hearing any improvement using these non-scientific products, they'll say the person has bad hearing, poor gear, or they simply aren't seasoned audiophiles, and don't know how to listen for it. Not much of a defense, since the result of these products cannot be heard by a lot of us, but also the scientific equipment that was used in the making of our gear.

If we didn't have designers that apply these time tested, and proven facts used in building our electronic gear, we wouldn't have any of it. What would we have for a stereo system? A wax cylinder with two (stereo) large horns for picking up the sound, recording it to the wax cylinder, and the same for play back?

What have we been listening to since we started this hobby? Poor sounding gear, due to not having these new tweaks?

What do we do with all of our recoded music that was made without these tweaks? Throw it all in the trash? Start all over? I have some fantastic sounding recordings, but then again, I'm tone deaf, or don't know how to recognize that these are supposed to sound bad according to the tweak people. Don't forget, they didn't use designer fuses in their making. Also, some other non-proven tweaks.

It was mentioned by someone earlier in the thread (I believe) that there must be a way of proving these tweaks. There is one method that wouldn't hurt the consumer, and seller, if they really work. Let the designers prove that they can hear their own products improvements. This could be done in their own system, and a neutral third party can change swap these tweaks in and out of their system. As much of a difference that could be heard according to them, should give over a ninety, to a hundred percent chance of identifying their own product. If they did something like this, it should give them a lot more credibility. Why don't any of them do this? It could be done in their own system, that they are totally familiar with. This sounds fair to me.

The builders of amplifiers, and other products, have their equipment get scrutinized in all kinds of measured performance, and listening tests. If their amps don't give the promised power, low distortion, sound, etc., the designer would have one nasty headache, with a lot of explaining to do. Damage control. Their products do have to perform as promised. These tests are done all the time.

We've had all kind of these tweaks come and go. Some are still around, but not as popular. A lot of people seem to have bought them, state how great of an improvement they gave, and then forget about them, or give up on a lot of them. Maybe designer fuses will be next of that list...