Cable "burn in"

I understand that before coming to conclusions about the sound of an interrconnect in your system, the cable must be "burnt in" for some degree of time.

My questions is -- can I do this "burning in" simply by hooking the interconnect up to, say, an FM tuner and the preamp, turning the turner on and letting it "play" while the preamp is turned off. If not why would turning the preamp (or the rest of the system) on during the "burn in" make any difference??