Hi-Fi Fuses - SNAKE OIL? - or something in it?

Prices are high in audio because the makers know damn well we're a bunch of suckers. And I'm first in line.

And something is happening here
But you don't know what it is
Do you, Mister Jones ?

You have many contacts
Among the lumberjacks
To get you facts
When someone attacks your imagination
But nobody has any respect
Anyway they already expect you
To all give a check
To tax-deductible charity organizations.
You've been with the professors
And they've all liked your looks
With great lawyers you have
Discussed lepers and crooks
You've been through all of
F. Scott Fitzgerald's books
You're very well read
It's well known.

:-)

Mapman wrote,

"Regarding fuses, I would say its a fact that no two electrical devices, including fuses, are 100% equal. Even two instances of the same design may not function 100% equivalently. So it is reasonable to expect that each performs differently. How much so and to what effect is the only question case by case. Plus all teh things that go along with that to determine value, which is pretty much always in the eye of the beholder/consumer."

I don't think I've seem quite so much angst and bs in more than a fortnight.

OK, I guess you guys think with your audio hearts and thats OK,after all if one thinks its true then in his ears it may be so. But if you do a square wave sweep thur a circuit with its well thought out fuse you will see no difference at all. I stand by my statement that its all in your head, please take no offense, I think your passion is why we love the Audio arts and this love drives the engine of progress.

I'm an old guy pushing 64.
I've been at this hobby for over 40 years and I've seen the same comments made back in the day when people started to state that the standard 18-22 guage zip cord was all that was needed to wire up your speakers and the interconnects that came in the box was all you needed.
Bookshelf speakers were just that, on the shelf, not on dedicated stands out into the room, and filling those stands with lead shot or sand? Come on give me a break, what can that do?
That's as stupid as putting spikes under your standmount speakers, and spending countless hours trying to find the sweet spot,when everyone knows that time should be spent listening to the tunes and the money spent on all that esoteric stuff like wires is just throwing money away.

Yet some of us moved on from that time, and now use dedicated lines, power conditioners, upscale wires and power cords and spend time placing the speakers in the room where they sound the best and tuning the room.

You don't have to do any of this stuff to enjoy the music, in fact to those who are still stuck in the mindset of the 1960's,it should be just about the music,and as long as the music is being played then everything is as it should be and "can not get any better than this".

"Life is good why rock the boat?"
Why throw any more money at this hobby than is necessary to make the music play in my room?

Yes what some of us do must seem like a waste of money on esoteric junk that shouldn't make a difference.
Especially if they've never bought anything that made a difference or heard somebody's system that was better than theirs .

I've seen comments made about how rotten some of the esoteric systems sounded at HiFi shows over the years, and those comments were often made by folks who say their system bought at a garage sale sounds just as good if not better to their ears.

I guess it's experience and exposure to some of that "esoteric"stuff that has made me one of the lunatic fringe who spends big bucks($20.00?)on an upsacale fuse, but I've heard what some of the stuff that can't make a difference does.

Everything makes a difference.
Not everything that makes a difference is for the better.
Some times it's all about trade offs.

A bit more detail for me might mean sterile or edgy to someonelse.
Warmth and smooth may mean wooly and lacking in definition to me.

So depending upon what system you insert a piece of the esoteric, you may come to a different conclusion than mine.
In that case no one can argue with you.

You tried it and it didn't work for you,it wasn't what you expected.But you tried it,you are entitled to an opinion.
Now in my system it might be just my cup of tea.

And so it is with fuses,chunks of wire or fuse bypassing.

It may seem like mumbo jumbo to some,but when you've had 30 plus years of fooling around with this part of the hobby,you get to know what is snake oil and what isn't.

People with Maggies know what fuses can do to the sound of their speakers.
Just look at a stock fuse,and it's impressive that we can hear any difference in speaker wires etc.
Esoteric fuses aren't much more robust, but enough so that you can hear differences between them and the stock ones.
I can easily tell when I used a stranded DIY fuse replacement or one made with solid core wire.
It's similar to the differences using stranded or solid core speaker wire.
Or perhaps there shouldn't be a sonic difference there either?

Some may have never had any experience with anything but good old zip cord,because that's all you need,as someone stated years ago when bragging that their gear worked just fine with nothing fancier than zip cord.And perpetrated as the gospel for decades later by the cable sceptics.
Here's my take.
What works just fine for some, doesn't work as well for others.
Will that be a hot dog or a fillet mignon you're serving with your fries?
It's all meat and potatoes, it's all about the music.

What your take is on hifi sound is not the same as mine.

What demands I make of my system and my expectations of good sound are different than yours.

Most of us never started at the same place and we haven't ended up at the same place over the years.
Our audio history, journey ,is not the same.Maybe similar.
Most of us have had many systems over the years,some may still enjoy the first system they bought.

All I can state to back up any of my claims is that over the years I've heard some stellar systems, and owned a few myself that made it very easy to tell when something made an improvement or not.

If it was an improvement I usually bought it,if not and I could return it I did.
Would I call the stuff that didn't work "snake oil?"

No, because some stuff is just too far out there for me to even consider, but if I could try it at no cost I'm open to just about any of the clocks , pebbles,discs,generators,nano stuff, that's out there.

But when it comes to things like wires, fuses and power products I've done enough experimenting with that stuff to know that it's not if they make a difference, it's all about how much of an improvement that difference is compared to what was in it's place before.