"I will re-iterate what I normally say to these threads; well designed audio electronics equipment and cables should NOT drift significantly (i.e. audibly)
between the time you plug it in and a few hundred hours."
laudable belief. Unfortunately reality is impervious to our wishes, beliefs, opinions or otherwise. Things either are or are not, regardless of what we believe they 'should' truly be. I have no beliefs on the subject, but only modest experience with just a few components. My ARC Ref 3 improved dramatically from 0 to 150 hrs, significantly up to 400 hrs, and subtly up to 550 HRS; its 6550 rectifier tube started to deteriorate at approx 1300 hrs and I replaced it at 1900 hrs; its replacement stabilized at 70 or 80 hrs. My X-01 Limited became listenable only after 200 hrs, was quite good at about 400 hrs, excellent at about 800, but kept improving subtly until about 1200 hrs. Different equipment may behave differently. . . or even worse, I may be totally delusional. |
Shadorne, could you tell us what you mean by 'quality of components', and could you give us some actual examples of high end gear you personally experience did not benefit from break in? |
Thank you Shadorne, I understand of course that superstable high end devices whose sound is largely optimized out of the box are likely in the hundreds, or perhaps even in the thousands, and that this is not the place and time for an exhaustive list. Unfortunately, I have not had the luck of finding even one of these marvels yet in my admittedly limited experience. Perhaps you would care to enlighten us with just 5 or 10 of the most well known and respected examples. |
Thank you Shadorne for the enlightenment. I am a little surprised about your findings. Yet Admittedly, I have not had in depth experience with the mainstream commercial audio brands over the last couple of decades, But I recall that just a few years ago, even the perfectly respectable stereo in my Toyota van took perhaps 200 hours to sweeten up. Regardless, now I keep track of changing behavior of any new piece of audio gear through a spreadsheet. Next time I have the opportunity of examining a device from a major electronic manufacturer, I will track any subjective changes--or lack there of--over time and may be able to form a more informed understanding of the matter. |
Shadorne, your last post got me thinking. . . what could possibly explain the 1200 hrs to complete break in for my TEAC X-01 Limited CDP? Perhaps Crypto-tubes. . . really tiny. . . really well hidden. . . perhaps kept secret by TEAC. . . real conspiratorial like? Or is it just a truly badd bad kind-a-hopeless solid state design cobbled together from bargain-basement parts. . . perhaps just one of them multi-K$$$ attractive boat-anchors which got foisted onto the financial shoulders of this poor audiofool? I should get rid of it ASAP. . . now that I think of it, I should dunk my Toyota van too, after all its all-solid-state stereo took about 200 hours to sound decent as well! |
Psychosomatic, huh? Or in other words. . . delusional, eh? And I thought that in 50 years of music I had reached a small modicum of insight. . . now I am really staggered by the harsh impact of factual reality! |
I am not sure what Krytrons have to do with the price of wheat in Alaska, or with audiophile-grade audio or even Radio Shack-grade audio electronics, for all it matters. Krytrons, made by EG&G or Perkin Elmer are high precision / high voltage switching tube-devices best known for their use in parallel honeycomb configurations when firing the chemical detonators that implode Plutonium 239 triggers of fission/fusion or fission/fusion/fission warheads. And trivially speaking, it is perfectly true that Krytrons are expected to fire precisely on spec the very first time they are activated. . . which is often their last time as well. . . no break-in planned, or allowed. So what? There seems to be a logical fallacy here somewhere. . . It is being contended that if for all electronic circuits, there exist at least one electronic circuit which can be built to fire completely on spec within 1 picosecond on first activation, then the same property must be inherently extensible to all electronic circuits. This is sheer nonsense. What we are discussing is whether for all electronic devices, there exists a subset of such electronic devices, digital, solid state, or vacuum tubed, which a significant portion of this audience extensionally deem to be high end audio gear, which tend to exhibit inherent and audible break-in patterns no matter how 'well' they have been designed/constructed/tested. |
Offense? That would be a little difficult Shadorne. I am rather enjoying your astute game of raising false targets, logical decoys, examples out of context, subtly corrupted induction steps, . . and projections of wishful thinking a priori of reality. |
Hi Shadorne, you are in fact absolutely right. . . there is almost a feeling of ancient magic to the hobby. . . . Some of it, perhaps like break in -- may be in part due to things our instruments have still problems measuring, as well as to the occasional minor dose of placebo effect. Other matters, like astute small clocks, aledgedly precious, semiprecious, or river-polished stones smack of neo-keltic rites and audiophilic-druidism. Next October at the AudioFest in Denver I should organize a grand sacrificial cerimony to propitiate onto us Audiana--sister of Gaya and great goddess of sound. Does anyone have a virgin piece of audio electronic whose yet unfulfilled life they would like to render into a burnt offering for the benefit of all of us? The cerimony would be very powerful and moving. . . lots of brilliant pebbles, Quantum dots, Clever Clocks of all makes and sizes, hypertweeters. . . . . . assurances of links to the mother of all web effects. . . the sacrificial Lamm all decked in audio finery and tied with audiophile-grade hempen twine to a brass audio isolation rack donated by Virtual Dynamics which keeps resonating like a tuning fork. . . and after we eliminate all stray Doppler effects, and we optimize the cloning of all its quantum states. . . replaced all its fuses with slugs of the best copper-Beryllium alloy, plugged its power chord into a 220V outlet, we will chant a final invocation and will throw its power switch. . . for an instant of firy and ecstatic break-in! |
