break-in--bane or boon ??

hi joe:

well there is the placebo affect.

what is so confusing is the difference of opinion among manufacturers.

i have found some cables do require break-in. i experienced this when i connected a pair of interconnects between a cd source and a receiver for 300 hours. then i reviewed the cable. i still had the cable in the system and three days later the stereo system sounded different. it could have been that the cable was not fully broken in.

there is only one way to be sure.

keep listening to the stereo system which has the componemt under consideration until the stereo system does not change its sound.

it's disconcerting when cable designers say that a cable doesn't break in but rather yours ears acclimate to the cable.

so the conclusion is that there is a variation in advice from manufacturers and there is no rule of thumb. i guess just wing it.

so i allow 300 hours, as a standard practice.

donjr is correct. YOU adjust to the sound of components over time; there are not radical changes to the sound of a system.

Read my "Audiophile Law #6: Thou Shalt Not Overemphasize Burn In" at Dagogo.com. I would post the link but it seems when I do it is quickly banished to some nether region. Do a search and you'll find it quickly.

The upshot of the testing was clear; components do not "burn in," no matter how much such a process is popularized. 300 hours for burn in is a complete waste of time. If the sound is not correct, change something. Active changes to the rig are FAR more productive than pining away for a change.

Ignore this advice and you will be wasting your time, pining for different sound which you could be actively pursuing but instead "waiting for it" to happen. Ridiculous! :(

I'm not interested in wasting weeks for a supposed change. I make the changes happen! I can take a new system and in one evening get it several steps closer to my ideal. I don't sit around and hope for it to change; that's absurd! It would be like hoping for a car to improve its handling.
The truth is that if you wait for a system to change you are effectively dumbing down your expectations, settling for less - the initially disappointing sound.

Wine improves with time, but not components. I can get more change in five minutes with a cable swap than the supposed 300 hour wait. I can tune a rig in 1.5 hours with a test of four sets of discrete opamps. So, why should I sit and be discontented for 300 hours? Ridiculous! :(

To date I have had no one, professional or amateur, contest my findings. I also have found no one who has replicated the test. I suggest those who doubt my little test, who ardently belive in Burn In, get double components and do the informal testing. I can tell you what will happen; you'll not be able to hear the difference. :)

Mrtennis, "so i allow 300 hours, as a standard practice."

Given the factors in play, it sounds like the wisest strategy.

I'm afraid thing are even worse than we might assume since active burn in devices and burn in tracks on some Test CDs will further improve cables that have been in the system for many years. Infuriating' ain't it?

GK

Doug, I thought that your article was excellent. Which is not say that I deny that all or even most claimed breakin phenomena are real. But I strongly second your basic theme that the only way to know for sure is to compare two identical cables or components in the same system at the same time, with one of them having been broken in, and one not.

I would further emphasize and/or add a couple of thoughts:

1)In addition to the possibility of user acclimatization, and the vagaries of aural recollection, it seems highly expectable to me that over the course of 300 hours of use sonically significant changes will occur that are unrelated to the cable or component being assessed. Aging or ongoing breakin of other system components, changes in AC line voltage and AC noise conditions, changes in RFI/EMI conditions, record wear due to repeated use, even seasonally-related changes in room temperature (temperature being a parameter that is fundamental to the physics of transistors and other semiconductors, for one thing). Again, as you indicated, the only way to rule out those kinds of possibilities is by direct comparison between identical items that are at different states of breakin.

2)I would expand your disclaimer about speakers being a special case, to which your article doesn't necessarily apply, to include all transducers (i.e., speakers, headphones, and phono cartridges), and also tubes.

As a point of interest, the most notable, extreme, and repeatable example of breakin that I have experienced is with my Stax electrostatic headphones. If they are not used for a period of a few weeks, which happens occasionally, there will be a day-and-night deterioration of their sound quality, that is instantly recognizable on most music. It can be corrected by having them play highly compressed rock music for a couple of hours, at volume levels that are higher than I would dare use if the headphones were on my head. That has been a consistent and repeatable phenomenon throughout the 25 years or so since I purchased them new.

Regards,
-- Al