2. cables
  3. 138221-974

Do speaker cables need a burn in period?

I have heard some say that speaker cables do need a 'burn in', and some say that its totally BS.
What say you?


128x128gawdbless
geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
14,147 posts
 
stevecham
No one here has the courage to talk about everyone’s brain burn-in period though. Neurons are far more adaptable than speaker cables. We are very good at the process of belief.

>>>>Fools rush in where angels fear to tread. Here we go again with the Anti Audiophile screed that it’s all psychological, audiophiles are easily fooled, directionality and burn in can’t possibly be real so audiophiles must be either lying or hallucinating. Maybe they’re two beers over the line. 🍺 🍺 Placebo effect, expectation bias, alien abduction, mass hysteria. 😂 Pick your fav.
taras22
236 posts
 
I’ll take alien abduction for a $100 Geoff.
twoleftears's avatar
twoleftears
1,457 posts
 

Auditory memory of sounds we're exposed too frequently over a long period of time is good: e.g. a parent's voice.

Auditory memory of a sound experienced once over a fairly short period of time, e.g. an auditioning of a new audio component, is very poor.

Hence, impossible to judge with your ears how much burn-in of cables helps.  If you listen to them once, you can't remember by the time they're fully cooked.  If you listen to them over a period of time, to form a more durable impression, you're actually burning them in while you listen.

All you can really judge is whether, subjectively, the experience of listening to them after burn-in is as positive to you or more so, compared to your judgment when you first listened.  This isn't the same thing.

nonoise's avatar
nonoise
4,382 posts
 
Factor in favorite music selections that you know very well and it's incredibly easy to discern break in, even with cables. When your equipment is already broken in, trying new cables with music that you're intimately familiar with is actually quite an easy thing to do. 

Don't we always cite our favorite go to CDs and records when evaluating gear? Why would it be any different with cables?

All the best,
Nonoise
andy2
484 posts
 
Why are we back to auditory memory stuffs here.  I feel like we are going back to the stone age.  Something we already talked about.
Like I said, manufacturers have a lot of cables lying around so they can do A - B between new and old cables so there is no need to recall something many days ago.
More to discover