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From: greg@olivej.UUCP (Greg Paley)
Newsgroups: net.audio
Subject: Speaker Fusing (particularly w/CD's)
Message-ID: <271@olivej.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 9-Jan-85 18:01:34 EST
Article-I.D.: olivej.271
Posted: Wed Jan  9 18:01:34 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 12-Jan-85 01:23:31 EST
Organization: Olivetti ATC, Cupertino, Ca
Lines: 51


A friend of mine, using an NAD CD player and Threshold amp managed
to blow all of the fuses on his Magneplanar MG-IIIB's.  Since he
had a pair of rear speakers running with a separate amp and was
doing other things while the player was on, he wasn't aware of
exactly when it happened or even which CD was being played.

In his case, this is no big deal since for $2.50 he can replace all
of the fuses.  I'm concerned, because the instructions for my
Vandersteen IIC's specifically recommend against fusing, with the
argument that it shouldn't be necessary and will inevitably cause
a deterioration in the sound.

I'm not about to blame the CD player outright.  I suspect that,
although my friend doesn't own any of the "notorious" speaker-killer
disks, such as the Telarc 1812 Overture or Wellington's Victory,
he probably turned it up loud enough to hear something like the
soft beginning of the Mahler 1st Symphony in another room, only to
be blasted by the forte sections.

The situation brings up several diverse points that I think merit
some discussion:

(1) How much dynamic range is really desirable for a home situation?
    In other words, do you really want to spend your time jumping up
    and down, turning up the soft passages to make them audible and
    turning down the loud passages so as to avoid being blasted out
    of the room?  It seems a practical limit of sorts has already
    been reached and, in fact, may have already been reached with analogue
    recordings.

(2) Is there an alternative, short of "on the spot" monitoring and
    speaker fusing to protect equipment in this situation?

(3) Perhaps the first one that should really be asked: is this a
    relatively exceptional occurence, indicating a defect in either
    the player, preamp, or amp, or is it something likely to
    occur fairly frequently when CD players are linked to high-end,
    high-powered (150+ Watts/Channel) systems in the hands of people
    who like their music fairly loud?

My personal concern is still somewhat theoretical since I don't yet
own a CD player.  However, another friend gave me the surprise of
my life by demonstrating his recent-model Sanyo player which,
though poorly isolated from shock and requiring a real struggle
to insert and remove disks from its drawer, produced sound better
than I've ever heard from a CD player in its price class.  I'm
still not about to rush out and buy one but, to say the least,
it's given me second thoughts.

	- Greg Paley