[tabrink]

Jackman said: The voodoo in audio-land is only eclipsed by the doodoo. 

That is so freaking funny I spit out good wine!
I love it!
Great job jackman! We are now wingmen!
 
Best observation ever.
Anybody want to buy ground attenuators? 
And it is all good because we are so confused we don't have a clue what sound s good.
I head the class.
BUT
Give me Virtue and Omega and I purr allot.

[werd]

There is no voodoo, doodoo, poopoo in it. If a speaker is built in Florida and shipped to Canada the environment will have an effect on the cabinet and maybe the electronics. Have you ever tried to install baseboards in your house with out letting them sit. Hardwoods also, if you install hardwoods immediately in your home they will warp. You need to sit them on your floor for at least 2 days.

The idea here isn't the speaker warping dramatically but that it will settle in. The question that is asked is it audible? Well it is an audio product, so is it out of this world to assume there will be audible differences in time?

People who say there are no audible breakins are hobby trollers here to wreck our hobby. Just spit on their dumb ass notions of audio and laugh while you do it......

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-18V5zTp2k&feature=related

[richidoo]

I would love to see how some of the guys who claim to hear speakers or caps "blooming" after 200 hours would do in a blind scientific test. If you can detect slight differences "at 150hz" that are a result of your speakers breaking in after hundreds of hours of break in, you are truly gifted...or Possibly delusional.

Or experienced. Listening is a skill that improves with practice, and identifying specific frequencies by ear is also a skill. Ask a mastering engineer.

Loudspeaker drivers change physically in the first hours of operation. Every speaker designer knows to run in the driver before measuring it's specs. The Q of the driver changes as the surround and spider wear in. This can be easily measured, and heard. 

This debate about break in has been going on for decades. The arguments are always the same. It doesn't matter what others believe, it matters what you believe. Your beliefs will change as you buy and use more and better gear over time. Eventually you will come to believe that some equipment does noticeably change during the first hours and days. Or you could focus on the music, and not care about break in. It is what it is, you already own it, so might as well just enjoy it. If it gets better, great.

[jackman]

Jackman said: The voodoo in audio-land is only eclipsed by the doodoo. 

That is so freaking funny I spit out good wine!
I love it!
Great job jackman! We are now wingmen!
 
Best observation ever.
Anybody want to buy ground attenuators? 
And it is all good because we are so confused we don't have a clue what sound s good.
I head the class.
BUT
Give me Virtue and Omega and I purr allot.

Thanks, my man, you have good taste in comedy.  To everyone else, I was just joking and would not THINK to suggest there is any snake oil in Audiofool-land, and to prove how sorry I am, I'm going to send each of you some SUPER INTELLIGENT CHIPS from the fine folks at Mechina Dynamica.  I'm sure the fine scientific minds at Mechina Dynamica share your view on break-in and lots of unexplained "complicated" audio stuff I can't even begin to understand. 

Also, if I win the $220million Lotto, I'll buy everyone on this site the world famous Machina Dynamica Clever Little Clock, which we all know will transform your system on par with capacitor, wire, and driver break-in.  I'm blinded by the science of this "amazing" invention.  It uses time-machine technology from the future to give you great sound!  If only I could use it to go to the future to get those winning lotto numbers, I could buy eveyone a Clever Little Clock!

Cheers,

J

http://machinadynamica.com/index.html

[neekomax]

Thanks, my man, you have good taste in comedy.  To everyone else, I was just joking and would not THINK to suggest there is any snake oil in Audiofool-land, and to prove how sorry I am, I'm going to send each of you some SUPER INTELLIGENT CHIPS from the fine folks at Mechina Dynamica.  I'm sure the fine scientific minds at Mechina Dynamica share your view on break-in and lots of unexplained "complicated" audio stuff I can't even begin to understand. 

Also, if I win the $220million Lotto, I'll buy everyone on this site the world famous Machina Dynamica Clever Little Clock, which we all know will transform your system on par with capacitor, wire, and driver break-in.  I'm blinded by the science of this "amazing" invention.  It uses time-machine technology from the future to give you great sound!  If only I could use it to go to the future to get those winning lotto numbers, I could buy eveyone a Clever Little Clock!

Cheers,

J

http://machinadynamica.com/index.html

 
 
 
 

Hahahahahaha! That site is crizazy man. As retarded as the 'Clever Little Clock' premise is, it's got nothing on the 'Teleportation Tweak' http://machinadynamica.com/machina60.htm
For a mere $60, if I have this correctly, you call on the telephone this company, and after the phone call, your sound (and video!) is better. Hahahahahahaha!

But come on, Jack, you're really gonna lump people who think break-in/burn-in is real with these d-bags? That's a bit extreme, I think. One is completely ludicrous while the other is debatable, and more importantly, quantifiable, from what I can tell.

[neekomax]

Or experienced. Listening is a skill that improves with practice, and identifying specific frequencies by ear is also a skill. Ask a mastering engineer.

Loudspeaker drivers change physically in the first hours of operation. Every speaker designer knows to run in the driver before measuring it's specs. The Q of the driver changes as the surround and spider wear in. This can be easily measured, and heard. 

This debate about break in has been going on for decades. The arguments are always the same. It doesn't matter what others believe, it matters what you believe. Your beliefs will change as you buy and use more and better gear over time. Eventually you will come to believe that some equipment does noticeably change during the first hours and days. Or you could focus on the music, and not care about break in. It is what it is, you already own it, so might as well just enjoy it. If it gets better, great.

This is a reasonable post indeed.

As far as being able to discern what 150 Hz sounds like, I do have a fair amount of practice identifying frequencies and what they sound like, as I used to eq mixes regularly in recording studios in my former career/life as a musician. It is something you get better at with practice. I wouldn't claim to be a master engineer, though. 

[Letitroll98]

Am I on the Path of Least Resistance Circle?  I cannot believe there is any controversy on this point.  All transducers change with time.  This is a fact that is written in stone, dead solid mortal lock.  And transducers change the most at the beginning and end of their service lifetimes.  This is another fact that can't be disputed by rational minds.  The magnitude and slope of these changes are quite variable, so how much, over what time period, and how perceptible to the user these changes are is very different from one speaker model to the next.  And even a particular speaker model will change at a different rate and magnitude because the application is different for every customer.  But change they will, surely as the sun rises every morning, do.  So arguing against any one person hearing changes in their new speakers is ludicrous.     

[Steve]

Or experienced. Listening is a skill that improves with practice, and identifying specific frequencies by ear is also a skill. Ask a mastering engineer.

Loudspeaker drivers change physically in the first hours of operation. Every speaker designer knows to run in the driver before measuring it's specs. The Q of the driver changes as the surround and spider wear in. This can be easily measured, and heard. 

This debate about break in has been going on for decades. The arguments are always the same. It doesn't matter what others believe, it matters what you believe. Your beliefs will change as you buy and use more and better gear over time. Eventually you will come to believe that some equipment does noticeably change during the first hours and days. Or you could focus on the music, and not care about break in. It is what it is, you already own it, so might as well just enjoy it. If it gets better, great.

Agree, and if I may add to your comment, different systems sound different. For instance, there is masking distortion differences etc. Some systems are more revealing, less masking than others. Less revealing systems may not allow for a perceived difference.

However, driver parts do physically change and are perceived as such. That is science and not opinion.

Cheers.

[*Scotty*]

The think what Jackman is trying to disparagingly refer to is ground enhancers rather than ground attenuators. The irony is that the ground enhancers are actually based on a real electronic engineering concept used in instrumentation design, the poured ground plane. They are a partial solution to the poorly implemented ground plane found in many consumer grade electronics.
Scotty

[lonewolfny42]

Jack...

Let's try to stay "on topic"....OK.

neekomax ..

Trust your ears...on what you hear.

[InfernoSTi]

If you can detect slight differences "at 150hz" that are a result of your speakers breaking in after hubdreds of hours of break in, you are truly gifted...or Possibly delusional.

Next you are going to say all amplifiers sound the same....

Why do we get "better" gear?  Flatter responses, better room treatments, upgraded power supplies?  Because we believe it sounds better (and sometimes it actually does). Some things are the big changes (like tubes from SS...oops, there is another argument) and some are small, like spending a day moving the listening chair and speaker to find a "better" sweet spot.

At some point, if it works for someone, does it really matter if it is between the ears or is measurable?  And if it is actually measurable...such as a 10% improvement in a meaning specification simply from burn in....why say it doesn't exist?  If you can't hear something that is 10% better, then I suggest better room treatments to begin with..... 

[Johnny2Bad]

Can someone please explain speaker break-in?
It's a mechanical object, an electric motor designed to precisely move air molecules.


Like all mechanical objects, it's performance varies over time, and eventually degrades with wear and exposure to it's operating environment, which is usually different from it's manufacturing and (new, unused) storage environment.


Like all mechanical objects, it's characteristics at manufacture differs from it's characteristics as received by the end user. These characteristics will tend to also change in first use and then settle to a slowly degrading, but usefully stable state.


During this early change in characteristics in first use, likelihood of failure is highest. Broadly speaking a well made product of any kind that survives the first use period will last to the end of it's practical useful life with a very low failure rate during this period.


Now, to assert there are no changes in performance or characteristics during first use, and that there is no stable period that follows in a product designed for relatively long life is simply ignoring reality.


With a precision instrument you should avoid assessing it's success or failure during the first use period and wait until the stable period arrives until assessing it's suitability for the job it's asked to do.


Exactly how long that first use period is will vary, and the best way to determine the likely length of that period is the experience of others familiar with the product. The experience of others may be based on measurement or personal assessment or both; but it's not necessary to require one or the other to take into consideration that experience as a guideline for your own assessment; simply use the best information you have available and go. We have no choice but to use the best information we have available, because the actual useful life of the product is unknown until the useful life has passed and the product fails.




Didn't even need to use the word "speaker" or "break-in".

[timind]

That is an excellent explanation from Johnny2bad.
My opinion is based on an experience I had with a new pair of Paradigm Studio 60s. Upon the first week of listening I was tempted to return them as there was a noticeable harshness in the lower treble. I can remember two specific cds where this was heard but I wasn't sure if it was in the recordings or system. About two months later I listened to one of the cds again and the harshness was gone. It was obvious to me.
I believe I also noticed it with used speakers although the effect was less obvious and the change was quicker (days).

[PRELUDE]

Hi folks,
I thought this site would answer you in a better way because all the manufactures also have their own opinion. It is a good read out,click on the link then click on THE CORNER.
http://www.matrixhifi.com/ENG_marco.htm

[richidoo]

Excellent article PRELUDE, thanks for the link.  The response from driver mfg Scan Speak is valuable advice!

"All you need is a sine wave generator and a power amplifier. Keep the drive unit in free air. Set the frequency to about 75% of the expected free air resonance frequency of the drive unit and turn up the voltage until the cone reaches full excursion without making mechanical noise. Let it run for 5 minutes and the job is done."

[Steve]

I think I would run it longer in case the other drivers take longer. Just precautionary.

Cheers.

[planet10]

"All you need is a sine wave generator and a power amplifier. Keep the drive unit in free air. Set the frequency to about 75% of the expected free air resonance frequency of the drive unit and turn up the voltage until the cone reaches full excursion without making mechanical noise. Let it run for 5 minutes and the job is done."

Check with the manufacturer. That procedure will damage some drivers. An example.

dave

[pansixt]

Great article PRELUDE. Thanks.

I particularly like the responses from Adire Audio and JBL Pro.
But then this is just my opinion of their opinions.

I intend to do my "run-in" with different music at different listening levels as these are my
usual listening preferences.

The outcome of this will be like anything should be in this hobby, a personal preference derived by personal experience.

But I will share. As also should be done in this hobby.

James

[richidoo]

I think I would run it longer in case the other drivers take longer. Just precautionary.

The alternative is to use the speakers for 5 minutes then dispose of them?

I exceprted the Scan Speak response. They say it can take a month for a whole speaker system, this 5 minute exercise is for bare drivers only, in free air, intended for speaker designers, not consumers.

[Steve]

Thanks Rich.

Cheers and great weekend.