Herman brings up a point that I have thought about quite a bit as well, while trying to understand what I was/am hearing. Herman says "I have never once heard anyone say that a cable sounded worse. They ALWAYS sound better." After playing with quite a few cables, I have answered this question to myself in this manner:
A good high end audio designer should use the END product throughout testing and voicing of a model, and I think a lot of them do just that. A simple example would be speakers. If I were building a pair of speakers, and wanted to see what 10 different midranges sounded like, here's what I would do: buy a couple of each of the midranges, and cook them on some signal/amp combination for say 200 hours. THEN, and only then, would I put each midrange into the cabinet, and see how it sings with the woofer/tweeter/crossover. Bear in mind, I would have cooked the woofer and tweeter for sure, and heck, maybe even the crossover parts (including some extra capacitors/coils to try). After this process, the combination of parts and some tweaking would produce the prototype. Now, to actually build to sell them, I would be ordering the parts in quantity, and assembling the speakers. Maybe I have time/space/money to give them 10 hours of burn in, or maybe more, and expect the owner to do the rest.
The end result is a product that out of the box does NOT sound the way I (the designer) heard it. But, since I accounted for this breakin, the speakers will sound BETTER with break in - every pair of every model that is designed as above.
Now, I have no idea how much of this is feasible for cables (that's why I used speakers for my example), but I know some cable makers do go through this process.
All in all, I agree that some of it is the listener breaking-in to the new sound, but I am very sure that cables do change their sound not only with burn in, but also from being moved. Some of the more noticeable examples I have run across include Purist Audio, Cardas, and some Straightwire models. Take a pair of these interconnects off, put them back in their box for a couple of days, put them back into the system, and there is a readily identifiable and PREDICTABLE course that the sound will take while the cables settle back in.
A good high end audio designer should use the END product throughout testing and voicing of a model, and I think a lot of them do just that. A simple example would be speakers. If I were building a pair of speakers, and wanted to see what 10 different midranges sounded like, here's what I would do: buy a couple of each of the midranges, and cook them on some signal/amp combination for say 200 hours. THEN, and only then, would I put each midrange into the cabinet, and see how it sings with the woofer/tweeter/crossover. Bear in mind, I would have cooked the woofer and tweeter for sure, and heck, maybe even the crossover parts (including some extra capacitors/coils to try). After this process, the combination of parts and some tweaking would produce the prototype. Now, to actually build to sell them, I would be ordering the parts in quantity, and assembling the speakers. Maybe I have time/space/money to give them 10 hours of burn in, or maybe more, and expect the owner to do the rest.
The end result is a product that out of the box does NOT sound the way I (the designer) heard it. But, since I accounted for this breakin, the speakers will sound BETTER with break in - every pair of every model that is designed as above.
Now, I have no idea how much of this is feasible for cables (that's why I used speakers for my example), but I know some cable makers do go through this process.
All in all, I agree that some of it is the listener breaking-in to the new sound, but I am very sure that cables do change their sound not only with burn in, but also from being moved. Some of the more noticeable examples I have run across include Purist Audio, Cardas, and some Straightwire models. Take a pair of these interconnects off, put them back in their box for a couple of days, put them back into the system, and there is a readily identifiable and PREDICTABLE course that the sound will take while the cables settle back in.