Furutech fuse

OP I share your dislike of the Furutech fuses. I tried them in two different units and in both cases I thought the fuses muffled the mids and highs coming out of my speakers.
IMHO a great alternative is Furutech’s little brother,,,, the Padis fuse.  Unlike the Furutech sound, the Padis fuses stike me as sounding very close to the SR Blue sound - open, airy, detailed with great bass, only at about $35 a fuse which includes shipping fron Germany.  Now-a-days, when I bring in a new piece of equipment and want to upgrade the fuse, the first place I look is to Padis to see if Padis offers a fuse in my size.  If not, then I look to pIck up a SR Blue. 
The big downside of Padis is that they are very limited in the Amp ratings they offer. Why they don’t offer fuses in all the amp ratings is beyond me. They’ve been offering the same fuse ratings and sizes for the last two years, so it doesn’t seem to me like they’re going out of business. Maybe if we started an email writing campaign.
You can only get them from their German distributer on eBay.
And for the worring kind,, they are PSE, SEMKO, & UL rated.

Toolbox

Hey folks.  A limited budget tweaker for nearly 40 years here, since first doubling up on lamp cord wire for speaker cables.  I hooked up with Rick Taylor who had a rough and tumble hi fi store in the late 90's.  For a time, Rick was the Audio Matiere  repair Tech for importer Marigo Audio Labs.  Search a dated but valid article by "Rick Taylor marigo dots" related to "under the hood" resonance work.  Rick also designed cables that challenged the big names.  We also experimented with all sorts of isolation, from airborne invasions to surface transfers.  It is fun to watch the long time naysayers wake up from their slumbers.  Art Dudley (love Art) has a "Basket of Deplorable Accessories" but recently admits "...love for IsoAcoustics' Gaia III isolation feet" under his Garrard 301 tt.  A long time vinyl proponent, he also finally dumped his Sony SCD-777 cdp for the Hegel Mohican.  Now Art, maybe some room tuning? 

Long time former editor of Phile John Atkinson (thanks, John) and TAS Editor Robert Harley have grudgingly come to regard power upgrades, isolation shelving and feet as invaluable in achieving great sound.  Extreme high end manufacturers are paying much greater attention to the positioning, dampening and electronic isolation of their builds and power supplies.  It also may explain some of the "less is more" philosophy of great, simple, early gear such as the overachieving Stewart Hegeman Hapi 2 preamp with its non-crowded design.  

Sorry for being a bit wordy, but needed to establish a little cred.  Once achieving the resolution capabilities of modern sources, I've had excellent results with fuse upgrades.  Yes, there can be a wonky break-in period where you second guess your decision.  My upgrade path has been Radio Shack ceramic, Hi-Fi Tuning to the Synergistic Research Blue Fuses.  If you look at my other posts, you will find that much attention has been paid to clean power in my system.

As a fellow of limited resources for my hi-fi passions, I generally don't begrudge the high cost of audio.  We have choices and nobody forces our decision making.  Patience is a great savings in the trickle-down world of high end.  Except for my source, my entire system is great second hand stuff, tweaked to improve them.  In the case of something new like fuses, the need to burn them in for 150-200 hours is no big deal...I simply leave the system up for a few days during good weather to decide if I want to return something under a guarantee.  I do stay away from possible black market sources and deal with established companies assuring authenticity and the ease of returning for credit.  A good example is my recent experience with Amazon for a cell phone, the LG V-30 with the quad dac.  It was a 3rd party purchase that had the Amazon guarantee.  It took a couple of tries to find a great refurbished unlocked one, but the end cost was $190.  Yes, there is risk after Amazon's 30 day guarantee, but I'm willing to gamble that anything major will go wrong before then.  Full retail was around $900 and it has become my "laptop" with decent headphone sound streaming hi-res and uber photo capability. 

We live in AMAZING times as music lovers for gear and source music.  Thanks for the read.  More peace.  Pinthrift      
 

noromance sez:

• Back story. I find the prices of Synergistic fuses extortion. Like someone charging $100 for a cup of water in the desert.

If I were dying of thirst in the desert, I would gladly pay $100 for a cup of water. Once back on solid ground, I would take cases of water into the desert and sell it to other thirsty people for $100 a pop. At that point, lots of other greedy jerks would follow me with truckloads of water, only to find that there is a glut of bottled water in the desert with thirsty people willing to pay no more than two bucks per bottle.

At that point, there would be plenty of water for everyone and thirst in the desert would be ended thanks to competition and the capitalistic system. It’s the same reason laser eye surgery is affordable now. Same for 65" LCD TVs.

Conversely, this is the reason the people in Venezuela are eating their pets.

Price is determined by supply and demand. If people weren’t willing to pay $150 for a fuse, or if other fuse manufacturers were to come out with an equal, or improved fuse for less, then the SR fuses would come down in price.

In the meantime, I, and my friends are enjoying the hell out of the SR Blue fuses.

Frank