I recently added the aforementioned fuse to my Wireworld 6 way distribution, after adding a number of Belden mains cables, note the Wireworld feeds only my Router, Switch, Fibre Bridge, TV and Sky box, the Nova is sited away and is powered off another mains outlet.
This is the reason I posted this on the Streaming thread.
The SR Blue Fuse has had me overwhelmed for quite a few days now, is has an steady break in, but to me the best way to describe the improvement is like major amp upgrade.
Again bear in mind the Fuse is not directly near my Nova, only the Ethernet is the link.
I have had to drop my usual listening volume by some margin, as the sound is so wide, the bass has gone an octave or few further, but very taut, tuneful bass, just so much more.
The level of detail is quite shocking, but to be honest overwhelming after a while, initially is wasn't so bright, yesterday it's was just information overload, today much more fluid.
My main point here is a very simple change not directly to the Naim gear, is bringing substantial improvements.
The fuse is apparently on 30 day return policy, so nothing to loose, just hoping the break in ups and downs smooth out, I've heard from the person who recommend it to me, it just keeps getting better, if that's the case for yes a shocking price for a fuse, this is an amazing upgrade, that's IF it settles.
Either way the fuse will stay as the improvement it has brought to my TV is amazing.
Posted on: 02 October 2018 by Anavrin
Mines got 15 hours on it now but I’ve taken it out, put it in my laptop bag and in the boot of my car, I will x-ray it at work tomorrow, see what’s inside, if there are any components or additional wires I will see them, if it’s just a straight wire with some material around it, it might not be visible, it has an interesting black blob in the middle of the fuse body and a hole in the SR label to allow it to be seen, could be graphene, it could be plugging up a hole in the casing.
There is a warning in the instructions not to remove said black blob.
Will see what I can see tomorrow, with the help of a little radiation
Posted on: 02 October 2018 by Innocent Bystander
I am intrigued by this but with Obsydian giving an enthusiastic "night and day" reaction to the difference it makes and Anavrin giving a lukewarm response to it I am a bit wary, despite the 30 day money back offer. I realise that Anavrin hasn't had the fuse for very long and therefore enthusiasm may well increase. I am watching this thread with anticipation.
One thing I have noted many times on this forum is that one person’s ‘night and day’ is another person’ ‘marginal difference’. Likely due to any of a variety of factors, from predeliction to exaggeration or understatement, system used (including room), type of music, purchase justification (especially expensive kit), expectation influence, and in the case of anything to do with mains power, the quality of the mains supply. At least with this particular item it seems that a free trial is possible by mail order, as well as being inexpensive in system terms, so no reason really not to try, provided it is indeed safe as a fuse...
So I don’t know why I am not trying (other than that I do like to understand what I am buying - but even that shouldn’t matter.)
one question has to be where in the system is most positive difference evident? So many potential options in some systems!
Posted on: 02 October 2018 by Obsydian
I'd side with IB, in the sense I to have tried a few forum WOW ideas to totally disagree with them.
The post was as many, I tried and thoughts, with the rare money back guarantee.
ANARVIN - if you don't like it from the start, it is unlikely you will ever, but id suggest as you have gone to the effort leave it in your Nova to settle and see.
Posted on: 03 October 2018 by Anavrin
Yes, me too, maybe it’s filled with snake oil or something, I just can’t work out what the black blob on the outside is, it back in my Nova now, having a play with ther powerline lite, with SR Blue fuse vs a custom Belden cable with a silver plug and silver fuse + rhodium coated IEC.
Its a tough call, both sound good but in slightly different ways, the powerline light with the SR Blue is a little more engaging musically,,,maybe lol
Posted on: 04 October 2018 by Innocent Bystander
Referring back to the x-ray image, maybe they have taken a standard fuse, drilled a hole and poured out the ceramic filling, treated the surface of the fusewire in some way with graphene, refilled with the ceramic filling, put a plug of black ‘goo’ to cover the cole, though rather surprisingly for the cost that has been done with an inelegant poor DIY-like finish, and applied a million volts like an extreme insulation flash-test.
And if there is a thin graphene coating on the fuse wire, what effect would it have? Graphene is said to have very low resistivity, so conceivable part - or even most - of the current goes through the coating rather than the wire. OK so far, but if that is the case the fuse wire will not be doing its job, and the fusing capability of the fuse will depend on the fusability characteristics, for want of a better description, of the graphene - i.e. how it heats up with current flow to reach its melting point (unconfirmed, but of the order of 4-5,000ºC, compared to under 1,000ºC for fuse wire), but then of course the graphene will heat the metal support wite, which will melt and fail to provide support so possibly breaking the graphene coating as it does so (unless the graphene is so strong that it holds together, in which case failure would be at the joint of the support wire and the end caps. This means that it would fail - but there would be a time lag for the indirect heating to melt the wire, while if there is enough graphene present to materially alter current flow, it would seem reasonable to expect that it would raise the required current to cause the fuse to blow, meaning that the characteristics of the original fuse would be altered to higher current and slower blow. So, if the fuse has been made as I suggested in the first paragraph, it would no longr provide the same protection as the original fuse - so hopefully that is not what they have done (unless they started with a lower rated fuse than 13A and tested afterwards to find it does meet appropriate requirements for a 13A fuse).
This brings it back to some of the observations about standards. Given that they are selling this as a fuse to replace the normal 13A protective fuse in the mains supply plug (keeping to this example - they do do other cartridge fuses) , then surely however they have manufactured the fuse they must have done appropriate tests to verify fuse blowing performance. ...Maybe this is something for someone to refer to the Trading Standards officers in the area where they are sold in UK to investigate?
Posted on: 04 October 2018 by Mike-B
This brings it back to some of the observations about standards. Given that they are selling this as a fuse to replace the normal 13A protective fuse in the mains supply plug (keeping to this example - they do do other cartridge fuses) , then surely however they have manufactured the fuse they must have done appropriate tests to verify fuse blowing performance. ...Maybe this is something for someone to refer to the Trading Standards officers in the area where they are sold in UK to investigate?
As far as I can find none of the audiophile fuse brands have claimed they comply with BS1362, they are just saying its a "13A". The only thing is to get them tested as unsafe such as a fire hazard. But as we already have significant numbers of 'counterfeit' fuses masquerading as established BS approved fuse brands all over the market, I suspect they might not be too interested in a few audionuts buying 10 cent fuses for mad money.
Another angle on this - given that this fuse's only function is to protect the plug, flex cable & IEC320 socket plug (the 'kettle' lead), its all a bit of a buggers muddle. The UK 3 pin BS1363 plug is rated at 13 amps, the PowerLine Lite 0.75mm/2 flex is rated at 6 amps, The full fat PowerLine 4mm/2 flex is rated at 32 amps & the IEC320 - no matter if its the Naim PowerLine Lite or full fat version or a Furutech made from kryptonite & anointed with rare earth fairy dust from Mars is still only rated at 10 amps. ............. confused.com
Posted on: 05 October 2018 by Anavrin
Just for the record the fuse is in the plugtop and not in my Nova, which remains pure and unsullied, as I received it.
It does sound better today, the Nova itself is fairly new but the improvement is noticeable, and im sure the SR Blue fuse is a bigger contributor to the difference than just the Nova running in alone.
Interesting someone mentioned earlier that the full fat Power Line is a two core 4mm cable, is it not earthed?
