lol........ i think the fuse is a good idea.......... think about all those amps, even one in a recent thread, that have been damaged by poor ground forcing the amp to draw through the rca's......... and, i'm sure you can replace the fuse with a 1/4watt 50-100ohm resistor on the board, as mentioned, and nill the problem. i haven't bought a newer pioneer, but all my old ones, and every deck i've owned, for that matter have been hot-swapped no problem... imho, the shiz isn't even poineer anymore anyways...... not since they got bought out. i still have the deh-8000, which was the last real poineer deck worth a fcuk........ for years after, i was repeatedly replacing the "magic 45; magic50" icu's and such, allong with knobs/faceplate issues......