Do cables really need "breaking in"?

I've done direct fresh VS "cooked" speaker cable A/B's twice. First time with 4, identical 5 foot lengths of Kimber 4TC cut from the same spool and terminated in the same way (spades with Wonder solder). I was going to Bi-amp my Acoustat 1100 and needed the 4 identical lengths. First I listened to them fresh as pairs in a single wire configuration to make sure they were working ok. The two pairs sounded identical. I left the last pair hooked up to the 1100's and hooked the first pair up to my Duo-Tech enhancer in the basement. And I promptly forgot about the first pair. I then went on vacation for over a week. Upon returning, I fired up the system and 1100's and everything sounded as before. I then remembered the other pair of 4TC cooking (about 10 days by now) in the basement, brought it back up and swapped it out for the "fresh" 4TC pair. I sat down and pressed play.....GOOD GRIEF. The difference was immediate and not subtle. More open, more relaxed, more liquid, more quick..the usual suspects. I went back and forth several times between the cooked and fresh pairs of 4TC and it repeated each time. Things with the cooked 4TC got even better after about a day of "rest". I repeated the same basic experiment (this time with Apogee Slant 8's) when I upgraded to Audioquest Sterling II. Results were very similar but not to the degree as with the Kimber (the single 25 foot run of Sterling already had some time on it).

I'm not sure why there was a difference, but a difference there definately was and it was quite beneficial. I have a similar story with interconnect wire.

Sean :

My A/B test under what turns out to be controlled conditions IS data. Though not measured with a scope & voltmeter but rather with my ears, it's valid data non the less. The tools of measurement were just different from those typically used to measure electrical components. It would have been nice though to have a set of electrical measurements. To try for a correlation for such sonic effects to measured electrical effects I imagine would require a rather large test matrix.

I suggest you repeat my experiment and report your results.

I too am an engineer who likes to "see the data" but in audio, there is more than one way to take data. I get real tired of people who scoff at the idea that the ear can be a meaningful measurement tool and insist that it be backed up with electrical data before pronouncing the effect real.

The ear/brain combination is a GREAT measuring tool for judging relative differences. For example, if I were to play a sinewave below 100HZ to somebody and then a 1KHZ signal, and while no audiophile may tell me exactly what frequencies I played, I'll bet every audiophile on this planet could hear a DIFFERENCE between the two signals.

What we were talking about here were the DIFFERENCES that burning in makes in the SOUND, not the measured electrical differences.

You don't need electrical measurements to hear an effect.

By the way, when I typed Sean in my previous post, I meant to respond to Seandtaylor.