I always subscribed to the idea of burn-in previously, having experienced the sound of a new component blooming and evolving over time. I've also put new components into my system that never became appealing no matter how long they seasoned (usually cables). As a result of this thread I tried a little experiment with new and burned-in cables. I bought a new set of Cardas Golden Reference interconnect, 1m length, for my turntable. Instead I thought it would be better to use the new cable on the CD player and transfer my existing identical but burned-in cable from the CD player to the turntable. This gave me an opportunity to compare the two cables to each other with relative ease by listening carefully to the old cables on the CD then replacing them with the new. Much to my surprise I heard very little difference, if any. The new cables sounded great right out of the box. And Cardas is one of the strongest proponents for burn-in. Go figure. Given the disparity of experience expressed here it's clear that burn-in has many complex variables. My simple experiment can hardly be extrapolated to the broader context of burn-in but it's got me thinking. Great thread!
