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Burning/breaking in new equipment?

I am a complete beginner to stereo equipment, never having even owned so much as a record or CD, but I have been reading about it and found what I thought were good deals, so I pulled the trigger this weekend.

The following are on their way:

Benchmark DAC3 (DAC and preamp)
Bryston 4B3 (power amplifier)
KEF R900 (speakers)
XLR cables (from Benchmark)

I have read that new equipment needs to be broken in for about 100 hours. Does that mean I have to play music through them for 100 hours at the same volume I would use when listening or can I play it at a much lower volume?

Note: I am a little worried that the above system might be too bright, sharp or clinical (as I have read about the previous generations of Bryston amps) but I am trying to go for clean, pure, true, honest, accurate, transparent — whatever that means, but I am thinking I want it to sound like what the artists, producers, directors, audio engineers, etc intended when they created, mixed and mastered each track, with nothing artificial added by the equipment. I also went with companies with more solid engineering and less marketing.

.

bobk3
inna
5,245 posts
 
It may be a few hundred hours of burn-in time, it may be less, you will hear it. Probably 100-200 for cables. While everything is burning in do not pay much attention to the sound - the process is often non-linear, it might sound okay one day and terrible next day. Low volume will do, you just want the signal to pass thru. I would not play speakers at high volume until they are burnt in, just low to moderate.
As for how it will eventually sound, it is another question.
bobk3 OP
9 posts
 
Thanks, so I can just leave them on 24x7 at a barely audible level?


bobk3 OP
9 posts
 
“As for how it will eventually sound, it is another question.”

Sound like you are not that optimistic about how that equipment will come together?


inna
5,245 posts
 
No no no, I have no idea, it is just that you never really know until you do.
Yeah, just leave it playing something covering the entire audible frequency range. Be gentle with the speakers. It's like breaking in new high performance car engine, very very gentle and nice, but then when the breaking in is over you can step on it.
randy-11
1,913 posts
 
You have some excellent components on their way

Treat it like the Grateful Dead said to do with a Love Light - turn it on and Leave it on

a low volume will simply increase the time for the active devices and mechanical parts (speaker cones) to burn in - don't worry about it, just let it run all week or so

it will sound very good to you out of the box

and... it is known to cognitive scientists that you will "burn in" - your perception will accommodate to the sound over time

-------------------------------------------

two other things you will eventually be concerned with:

room treatments

source material (e.g. some CDs sound a lot better than others, so you'll want to track down the best masterings of an album) -- tho you don't say how you will feed your DAC


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