DIY cable break-in (esp. silver wire)

Tonto Yoder · « **on:** 2 Dec 2004, 09:05 am »

Looking through AA archives, I found an old post on a DIY MOBIE break-in device. The specific thread dealt with silver wire.

BobM · « **Reply #1 on:** 2 Dec 2004, 01:38 pm »

Break in definitely is necessary with any wire, but silver poses special problems and seems to take more time. Well worth it though.

I had several pair of well used 89248/89259 twisted pair IC's. In my system for about a year. I borrowed a friend's break in device and burned in each IC for 2 days, keeping track of the directionality (it makes a difference also).

I put everything back in and had a very noticeable opening of the soundstage. I say very noticeable, because this was not subtle and not due to sonic memory degredation. My wife even commented and wanted to know how much I spent on the new component (hard to convince her I spent nothing).

Enjoy,
Bob

Tonto Yoder · « **Reply #2 on:** 2 Dec 2004, 01:58 pm »

Quote from: BobM

Break in definitely is necessary with any wire, but silver poses special problems and seems to take more time. Well worth it though.

.

I hate to put words in his mouth, but Bob Crump (author of the above link) seemed to suggest that silver might NOT break in even with time under normal circumstances: hence the creation of the MOBIE unit or its DIY alternative which "Maximum Overdrive" the wire. I just got some of Crump's TG Audio silver speaker wire and it doesn't exhibit the brightness many (inc. myself)associate with silver, but he breaks-in the cable before ever sending it to customers.

Mudcat · « **Reply #3 on:** 3 Dec 2004, 03:19 pm »

http://www.audioholics.com/techtips/audioprinciples/interconnects/speakercablebreak-in.php

http://www.audioholics.com/FAQs/Audioquest.html

http://www.audioholics.com/techtips/audioprinciples/interconnects/top10cablesnakeoil.php

http://www.audioholics.com/techtips/audioprinciples/interconnects/dielectricabsorptioncables.php

http://www.audioholics.com/techtips/audioprinciples/interconnects/cabledistortiondielectricb.php

http://www.audioholics.com/techtips/audioprinciples/interconnects/audiocablessnakeoil.php

Maybe if more people read the available information, decent cables would only cost a fraction of what they do now.

Tonto Yoder · « **Reply #4 on:** 3 Dec 2004, 05:27 pm »

Thanks for all the audioholics links: I've filed them with the "Watchtower" pamphlet the Jehovah's Witnesses left yesterday.

cjr888 · « **Reply #5 on:** 3 Dec 2004, 05:30 pm »

Tonto - are you looking to build one, or comments on those that had one? I had a MOBIE for some time...

Quote from: Mudcat

.... Maybe if more people read the available information, decent cables would only cost a fraction of what they do now.

Like any market, there are good products at cheap and expensive costs, and bad products at cheap and expensive costs. Being that this thread isn't about cost, when finished patting yourself on the back, please comment on your personal experiences and theories on the MOBIE.

I'm on lunch, so wasn't able to read all the links provided, but when finished, could you PM me with a link to where they played music? I don't have time to identify which part of which link its in, and I'm trying really, really hard to get sound output out of both my scope and one of the articles from the URL, but I don't hear anything yet. I printed out the article -- should I maybe be holding it by my right ear instead of my left?

Tonto Yoder · « **Reply #6 on:** 3 Dec 2004, 05:50 pm »

Quote from: cjr888

Tonto - are you looking to build one, or comments on those that had one? I had a MOBIE for some time...

Not thinking of building one, but thought others might be interested. Crump's DIY pseudo-MOBIE wouldn't be too expensive, esp. if one had an old receiver around to supply the power.

Mudcat · « **Reply #7 on:** 3 Dec 2004, 05:53 pm »

Quote from: cjr888

please comment on your personal experiences and theories on the MOBIE.

Never used it, because I do not believe in cable's burning in. Not because of my frequenting AH, but because of a lot of work I use to do with the Navy. Do you think that the Navy would want the best signal transfer in both the audio spectrum up through gigahertz? They do not require, or even look for burned in cables. There is no mil-spec for cable burn in.

Now don't go off and say that it is not audio, because it is. Sonars work well within the audio range and lower. There are a lot of other applications but most are classified in some way or other probably, but I'm most familiar with sonar.

ctviggen · « **Reply #8 on:** 3 Dec 2004, 06:56 pm »

As an EE, I also don't believe in burn in. However, many people swear by it. I haven't been able to set up any double-blind tests using the same equipement, one with burned in cables and one without. While I do think that interconnects can affect the sound, I think most of what's sold is snake oil. I have, however, bought into this at times.

BobM · « **Reply #9 on:** 3 Dec 2004, 07:23 pm »

Thinking like, and discussing this subject like an engineer, it is easy to understand why different cable geometries MAY have differing electrical properties. Different degrees of capacitance, inductance, RFI and EMI rejection and such are easy to understand. So thinking like a physiisyst - cables with differing properties can have differing electrical effects on the signal and can possibly sound different.

As for burn-in, well that's still black magic. I have heard it, and I suggest you also try it for yourself before you poo-poo it. Testing, testing, testing to identify the ACTUAL results rather than the pre-testing theory and hypothesis, ya know.

My theory is all poobah, but here goes: Cables have a crystaline structure. Electricity follows the easiest path. Burn in helps define that easiest path and make it an even easier road for those pesky little electrons to traverse, without falling into endless dead-ends. This helps explain directionality too, since the way back is not always the same as the way there.

Now as for dielectric burn-in ... I'll leave that to others.

Enjoy,
Bob

Steve · « **Reply #10 on:** 11 Dec 2004, 02:46 am »

Found this interesting article some time back. Thought it might be useful.

On Capacitor Dielectric Materials - A Chemist's View
Karl A. Weber, Ph.D.

http://www.audience-av.com/on_capacitor_dielectric_material.htm

Red Dragon Audio · « **Reply #11 on:** 11 Dec 2004, 07:35 am »

very interesting that the oil of sperm has a dielectric constant of 3.2...why they wanted to meassure that or why I even brought it up is beyond me.

Cotton ranked very well at 1.3-1.4 and seems to be the best dielectric in terms of ease of use, cost and overall feasibility besides air. I guess you could pump nitrogen into a set of cables as it ranked at a dielectric constant of 1.00058(at 68deg F which is about room temp); plus it wouldn't react with copper or silver to form an oxide...which I guess is obvious right away since nitrogen isn't oxygen....it's late...

Hey...there's an idea...cables pumped with Nitrogen to have the best dielectric. Nitrogen is very stable, has a large molecule so it won't escape the tube and isn't expensive. that's one hellva an idea but I'm sure someone has already thought of this.

Gordy · « **Reply #12 on:** 11 Dec 2004, 02:20 pm »

I saw a tongue-in-cheek product write-up (A'gon?) for speaker wires using liquid N2. It was recommended that the compressor be placed away from the system...