Synergistic Red Fuse ...

" Are you noticing while listening to your Ohm 5 system that instruments have a more tactile organic presentation?"

If there is a difference it is very subtle but this is as good a term for what I think I might be hearing different as any.   The thing is I am not really hearing a clear difference with recordings I am most familiar with.

 Are you finding yourself more immersed into the music than is usually the case?

I was immersed last night but usually am when I am relaxed and able to focus on the music and not other things.

Are you finding yourself listening to entire recordings/CD/vinyl/high-rez downloads, instead of jumping around from recording to recording and/or cut to cut? 

Not enough listening yet to say.   In general, sound quality hardly ever prevents me from listening to particular recordings.  I find most to be involving even if technically limited.  As long as no clear unintended distortion is there.   That was a big goal for me putting together my setup, to be able to listen to and enjoy all music.

jafree, I need to pick up more of the Hayward mixes.     I think I have his version of In Search Of the Lost Chord and maybe Octave but that's it.

OP,

One thing I should say is that I am not one to continually pick apart how my stuff sounds.   I've managed to get past all that with the setup I've assembled currently.   The fuse is there and sounding good.    It may be  providing some change in the sound.   It sounds really good fuse in or out.  If there are differences, they are subtle so either way works.   I dabbled with a/b compares the other day and am done with that.   The fuse will likely stay in now that its there.   If it blows would I replace it?   Dunno yet.  I'll wait to cross that bridge.  I am not likely to be running out and replacing all my fuses with these though.

Georgelofi,

I have no doubt that no fuse is likely the best fuse for performance but I’ll pass on that. It is what it is. If I need better sound I’ll figure out some other way to get it beside eliminating the fuse that the designers deemed wise to put in there..

Papa also someone above pointed out that the fuse ARC put in their unit appeared to be not your typical Walmart variety fuse.

I would agree. The slo blow fuse that was in my ARC sp16 looked quite substantial and nothing like the slo blos we used to sell at Radio Shack. Some thought appeared to go into it. So I don’t think its safe to say that those making our gear always give fuses the short shift. There are many reasons why ARC has been as successful and been around as long as they have. They make great sounding gear to start.

Also I noted earlier that back in my hifi sales days, I recall convincing myself that slo blo fuses made more sense for use in hifi gear than fast blo and developed a preference for those based on teh gut feel that every slo blo fuse I have seen has a more substantial filament and is more forgiving of current passing through and I think its a safe assumption that teh fewer bottlenecks anywhere the better..

Its also almost always the case that one can only judge something new in comparison to what came before it. The quality of fuses being replaced by audiophile fuses surely varies widely. That alone could account for why different people hear different results. I tend to downgrade any review of any product when the reviewer fails to acknowledge what the gadget he thinks sounds so great is replacing.

So for me, its never been about whether a fuse can sound different or not. Its more about the value proposition of various options. $100 is small fry to pay as part of a 5 digit system. Yet there may well be other commercial fuses out there of similar quality still for less than $1. That’s still a huge difference to justify. When the time comes to replace a fuse, I will surely still consider all the alternatives based on pure technical merit.   If the $1 fuse does not cut it, no big loss.