Synergistic Red Fuse ...

Mapman wrote,

"Obviously you believe the problem has not been solved effectively. That’s fine."

nope, one, never said it. What's obvious is there's been an evolution of fuses over the years. You know, since fancy expensive audiophile fuses first came out twenty years ago. 

Mapman also wrote,

"But I notice you tend to fear problems are more severe than most."

Maybe I'm more aware of problems than the average bear. I'll sign up to that. Not fear. 

Mapman also opined,

"Maybe consider dumping your fuse less Sony Walkman and trying "a real system". With fuses even."

No fuse. No power cord. No ground, no house AC. No interconnects. No speaker cables. No problem. 

Finally, Mapman said, I'm pretty sure in frustration,

"Then you can actually you know do something to learn about what fuses sound like rather than just theorize."

Huh? I'm the one who can hear, remember?

" No fuse. No power cord. No ground, no house AC. No interconnects. No speaker cables. No problem. "

No wonder the purests in these parts all love you.

Mapman ...

Its a mystery to me as to why the fuses were so significant of an improvement in my system while no improvement was detected in your's and a few others. The only thing I can come up with is that I've spent an inordinate amount of time, effort, and money over many years to reduce micro vibrations throughout the system and in the listening room.

Everything I could think of in the area of vibration control has, or had been addressed. Even after all of these years and effort, I'm still finding areas of improvement as new products are developed. The latest being the SR High Frequency Transducers (HFT's). These things are NOT subtle at all. Amazing, really.

I've paid attention to large and minor details as far as micro vibrations are concerned from the turntable all the way back to the back wall of the room.

My equipment stand is made of three layers of plywood with constrained dampening material between each layer. The stand is spiked to the floor. The equipment rests on granite platforms. each layer is machined to close tolerances with more dampening material sandwiched between the layers. The ARC equipment is built with dampening material inside the chassis and the tubes are dampened with tube rings. Even the placement of the tube rings has been done to ear. We have Warren Gehl at ARC to thank for that. He's an engineer with a specialty in vibration control. I've learned tons about this stuff from Warren over the years. Over time, Warren has developed a turntable mat, a CD mat and even a tonearm wrap that works quite well. He's responsible for the design of the granite platforms that my electronics rest on and that are on top of my speakers. 

So, here's the bottom line. I think that because such attention has been applied to the fine details, any improvement (or detriment) can be heard immediately ... and they can be profound. 

You asked me to compare the speaker platforms to the fuses. The Mapleshade platforms were a major step from top to bottom. As the bass was cleaned up, it affected the mid-range and the highs significantly as well. Everything was more focused in a big way. I finally had a bass that was clearly defined. 

With the fuses (and keep in mind here, there is a huge difference between the SR Red fuses like you tried and the Black fuses), right off the bat, from the first RED fuse, it was like going from a standard tube TV set with white noise that you didn't know was there, and then converting over to a new LCD TV.  The clarity, depth and width of the sound field were improved dramatically. The most striking improvement from the fuses, especially the Black fuses, was the improved organic nature of the sound of instruments. Much more realistic and emotionally involving. Its what compelled me to start this entire thread in the first place. 

So, I would encourage anyone reading this who is seriously into great sound and music to seek out ways to get everything in the system under control from a vibration standpoint. Consider the room itself to be part of the system and control that too. It can be something really inexpensive like tube dampening rings, cable elevators for your speaker cables, or expensive as well, like Shakti Hallographs in all four corners of the room. Everything makes a difference for better or for worse. Find the better and chuck the worse. :-)

 http://shakti-innovations.com/hallograph.htm

So, what do you think, mapman?  I have no way of knowing what you've done in the way of fine details as described above. I'd be really interested in your assessment. 

Thanks ...

OP

OP,

For comparison, my main gear is in my office on foundation level, concrete floor with thin dense carpet and padding. A most solid foundation to start with. Bel Canto ref1000m amps are on an antique wood stand with soft padded top. SB touch on top. ARC Pre-amp, mhdt DAC and Linn turntable sit on a solid maple antique coffee table less than 2’ tall. It is quite heavy and rock solid. All gear is along left side wall. Isolation is quite good by design, by far the best I have ever had at home. How do I know? Its a small room with speakers facing gear and there is no noticeable feedback or noise with turntable playing even at top volume, which is never easy to accomplish. A solid foundation like the foundation level of a structure offers is the ideal location to start and makes all else easier.

Detail, imaging, soundstage, dynamics are all top notch I would say, in line with the best systems I hear out there after a lot of attention in recent years.

My best speakers, teh large OHM F5s, are in an adjacent room connected via in-wall wires to gear in room next door so no interaction between those and the gear driving them.

Also when I had our house built, I had the walls surrounding my office where the gear resides fully insulated and a solid wood door put in. I can listen in there quite loud at night and bother no one.

So I think I am in pretty good shape isolation wise. I also have done things to minimize RF and EM interactions as well, mostly all very simple low cost tweaks like setting my phono step up transformer in a mu metal foil container and paying careful attention to positioning of wires relative to nearby power transformers.