[Digital Enigma]

@Adu

I sent Arcam a message and this was their response

“Thank you for contacting Harman Luxury Support,

As much as I would love to provide you with the internal specifications you need for the fuse, they are not accessible to the general public and are only provided to authorized service centres or authorized dealers as we work on business-to-business (B2B) transactions.”

So I decided to do a little digging and opened it up myself

Here you can see it’s a timed (slow) fuse
T800mA 250V

 

[Digital Enigma]

Decided I’m going to go in deep on giving this little gem some serious love.

Recapping the entire board with Nichicon, Panasonic and Audio Note capacitors using Cardas silver solder.

Changing out the fuse with Hifi Tuning Supreme Cardas copper

Ditching the switch mode power supply for a Sbooster linear supply.

Once I’ve completed the work I’ll add photos to this thread.

 

[Adu]

Nice! We’re waiting the pictures and with your impressions about sound quality.

 

[Digital Enigma]

Nice! We’re waiting the pictures and with your impressions about sound quality.

Im not expecting huge improvements but I believe attention to detail in regards to component quality and reducing RF noise can go a long way in eliminating/ reducing a lot of the harshness and fatigue associated with “digital” sound.

Those Teapo and Jamicon capacitors used in the Arcam are bottom of the barrel cheap parts are chose because of max profits which is understandable for amp of this price range. It’s worth every penny just for the class A circuit design by John Dawson and the metal casework.

I will let it have a good break in time as well once modded before giving it a proper listen.

 

[Digital Enigma]

Taking longer than I anticipated but here’s the new fuse.

 

[Adu]

Taking longer than I anticipated but here’s the new fuse.

Is the correct direction of the fuse ?

 

[Digital Enigma]

Is the correct direction of the fuse ?

Im not sure what you are asking? fuses don't have a polarity, current flows in both directions.

 

[Digital Enigma]

So my impressions after the install, I turn the amplifier on and let some juice run through it for roughly 6 hours mainly to check everything was ok.

I was expecting a change in dynamics, bass quantity/ quality and I didn't get that but the improvement I do hear is a delicacy to the treble, not in a fragile or brittle way but very refined and articulate.

@Adu you mentioned that you wanted to do the same, did you have a specific fuse in mind? Personally I wouldn't spend a lot, the one I have cost £45 and I wouldn't spend more than that for an amplifier of this price range but even then if I had one those car priced amps I don't believe in spending thousands on tweaks like this.

 

[Adu]

Im not sure what you are asking? fuses don't have a polarity, current flows in both directions.

The fuse have printed a direction and the producer recommends to install the fuse in the direction flow the current.

 

[Adu]

@Adu you mentioned that you wanted to do the same, did you have a specific fuse in mind? Personally I wouldn't spend a lot, the one I have cost £45 and I wouldn't spend more than that for an amplifier of this price range but even then if I had one those car priced amps I don't believe in spending thousands on tweaks like this.

I changed also the stock fuses in rHead and in power supply (Farad Super 3) with hifi-tuning supreme3 silver/gold ; there was a slight difference in sound quality (after 300 hours).The biggest difference in sound quality was when I changed the power supply.

 

[Digital Enigma]

The fuse have printed a direction and the producer recommends to install the fuse in the direction flow the current.

Even if current was directional there’s no positive or negative markings on the pcb to know which way it would go in.