Do speaker cables need a burn in period?
You absolutely make no sense. Are you even considering real world cost? As I said, where I came from it costs money to purchase equipment and to hire people to do things.. What crawled up you and died? Your insistence on staying ignorant of what boils down to some very common knowledge around here smacks of one being willfully obtuse. Having a particularly bad day? All the best, Nonoise |
This has degenerated into one big pie fight that has nothing to do with audio and everything to do with ego. How many times must we read the same links and arguments that have already been tossed in the dung heap of history? Nothing new or revelatory is being discussed. Go and enjoy your systems. All the best, Nonoise |
Like I said before, just a quick look around would dispel any questions: https://forum.audiogon.com/search/index?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=cable+burn+in+services There's more as well using other search parameters. All the best, Nonoise |
This is fast becoming an audio version of "Groundhogs Day". I've posted something like this before but it bears repeating:https://phys.org/news/2013-02-human-fourier-uncertainty-principle.html Here's an prime example of what our ears can do that an instrument can't. A complex signal is sent but it's our ears that differentiate the information. Measurements can't do that on the fly: they have to deconstruct the signal to analyze it. In that respect, yes, instruments are more exacting than our hearing but our ear/brain relationship can give hoot because they've already heard and deciphered it. That signal can only be measured in a gross manner if put on an equal time footing as our ears. So it is with cables. We listen, on the fly, analyze instantly, and enjoy. Or not. It's our ears that are the final arbiter, and it's cables that can limit it. All the best, Nonoise |
Once one wraps their head around the perfectly acceptable concept of our hearing being better than a measurement (more exacting, differentiating, etc.) then "testing by ear" is one of the final steps one takes. Measurements only take you so far. Refining be ear is what every make of audio gear, that I’ve read about, does, bar none. Show me a piece of gear, or cable, that was made just to meet a spec so as to satisfy some safety standard and I’ll show you an average sounding product, if that. To simply pooh-pooh such statements as "tested by ear" betrays a dogmatically and hermetically sealed mindset. And, as pointed out over and over again, the signal is always there. It's there every time you play something just as it's always been there with the original cables used in the recording, but which masked what you could hear. Using a better designed cable simply reveals more of original signal that's always been there. That's not a hard concept to wrap one's head around. All the best, Nonoise |
Prof, do yourself a favor and check out the specs on a set of Darwin Truth II ICs and a pair of Blue Jean Cables ICs and you'll get it. The Darwins are well within spec and yet they sound demonstrably better. So, no, I don't mean for you to chose a wire that has the wrong specs for the job. For you to infer that that was what I implied is intentionally misleading. You're better than that. Or are you? It's those small differences (when strictly adhering to only measurements) that accounts for some of the differences in sound. Adding in construction techniques and materials used accounts for what doesn't fall into the measurements. And, leave out the mentioning of great lengths needed to incur a measured difference as I know that when it comes to measurements. I wish I didn't need to add that caveat (but had to leave it in). As for your last statement, I'd say your hackles are up. All the best, Nonoise |
Andy2, you’d be surprise to know that what you say is what I do when listening for auditory clues of music I’m familiar with. I don’t prejudge the cables. I look for differences in presentation. It can be done one right after the other or even weeks or months apart when the clues I listen for are still, and always there. It’s easy to notice. Again, you posted when I was composing. blah, blah, blahbetrays some serious intellect. All the best, Nonoise |
Nice clay animation. The joke they should have asked the devil is:What's the difference between "lace curtain Irish" and "shanty Irish"? The lace curtain Irish takes the dishes out of the sink before they pee. And yes, I'm part Irish. My grand mother watched her great uncles, Larkin, Allen and O'brien hang in Fenian's Arch in Manchester Square, which started the Easter Uprising. Back then they were known as the Irish Republican Brotherhood. All the best, Nonoise |
If what you mean by flat out defective, it doesn’t need to be that to mess with the signal. I’ve lots of cables laying around of many types and each one sounds different. Some are close sounding in most areas and some vary a lot. Do you think that a 30 something gauge, single silver wire IC in a basically air dielectric can’t sound demonstrably different form a run of the mill, copper stranded Blue Jeans IC? Where’s my Barolo? And Andy2, you’re arguing the same point of view I am but stubbornly limiting yourself to just your way of seeing things. Step back and take a breath. But, if it’s the last word you need to have, then by all means, you can have it. I see you posted whilst I typed so allow me another dragon of yours to slay. Your stipulation about how components factor in has nothing to do with me as my observations are with equipment already broken in. They are a constant in all of this. Stop with the Red Herrings. All the best, Nonoise |
Andy2, the logic seems to elude you my friend. I object to your saying I can't handle the truth when, if you bother to actually read what I said, I'm referring to music one is intimately familiar with being the standard to go by and not the memory of the cable is was played through. Lots of cables can come close in sound just as some can tamper with it. So, once you know how something sounds to your liking, the rest is easy. No audio memory is needed when you have exacting familiarity with how a chime or bell sounds when played back through different cables. The same goes for fine, tonally textured base compared to one note base that can be introduced by an inferior cable. That, and the fact that you need not spend serious coin to get great sounding cables. But having said all that, you'll screw it up to your way of seeing things, as is your wont. All the best, Nonoise |
Snark aside, of course it does. One only has to have a highly resolving integrated, like, say, the Kinki EX-M1 to amplify the differences that other, lesser gear can’t do as well, to the point where it’s painfully obvious. As for Andy2, I’m fine with the truth, it’s your premises I can’t handle. All the best, Nonoise |
Why are we back to auditory memory stuffs here. I feel like we are going back to the stone age. Something we already talked about. When you take that trip back to the stone age, don't forget to pack your beliefs in mass hypnosis, mesmerism, mass delusion, being unable to trust your senses, high enough levels of naturally occurring drug like substances in one's system to promote hallucinations, and other voodoo and superstition. Oh, and stop repeating it as well. All the best, Nonoise |
Factor in favorite music selections that you know very well and it's incredibly easy to discern break in, even with cables. When your equipment is already broken in, trying new cables with music that you're intimately familiar with is actually quite an easy thing to do. Don't we always cite our favorite go to CDs and records when evaluating gear? Why would it be any different with cables? All the best, Nonoise |
Whoa there people. I, for one, believe in burn in but not the outrageous pricing of cables. There is a lot of gray area here so generalizations should be greeted with about a pound of salt, when they occur. There's lots of overlap in these discussions that seems to be glossed over or neglected for the sake of a point. I've mentioned this before, but it bears repeating. My current speaker cables are designed by a former Belden engineer, required break in, and were very reasonable in cost. There. I've covered three areas of contention with an acceptable solution. All the best, Nonoise |
Hey prof, my straw men have not feet of clay. 😄 It's just that they can't be successfully dismissed, out of hand, on the fly, despite attempts. As to your second accusation, it sounds more like projection on your part, as it presupposes only you can be right. Now that's a straw man we can all agree upon. 👍 All the best, (and time to check out to watch from afar......) Nonoise |
Every so often, I'll pop in here to gauge the proceedings and there's always one theme that remains steadfast. That of Leviathan: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leviathan_(Hobbes_book) Just as in politics and religion, there are those who simply can't trust the masses. They need constant supervision and guidance. They can't be trusted and the premise of their arguments are that they are delusional and/or mistaken, and not much else is allowed or entertained. Some will say that's too strong a statement but if one were to be truly objective, the overlap is obviously and painfully apparent. Hobbes' call for an absolute sovereign seems to be an underlying cause de celebre around these parts. We need go no further than what is and has been written. There is nothing left for the masses to learn on their own. Thank goodness I've been in this hobby long before I came to this site as I've always heard and experienced break in with components and cables and took it as a natural event, not even up for debate. The final sound determined whether I kept something or moved on. Long before the camps and bubbles of the internet, every maker of gear all said the same thing: expect some break in. No biggie or controversy: it was a given. Conventional wisdom for sure, but based on empirical observation. Then the price gouging and charlatans started to flourish resulting in a backlash that went overboard. Everything was to be doubted; back to the manuals! Polarization intensified driving the camps further apart. If I had started this hobby along with this site, I might have ended up deferring to the experts on the subject of "break in" and go against reason and experience, doubting my own senses and perceptions, and upon being confronted with the actual evidence (hearing it), been driven into yet another episode of cognitive dissonance, getting angrier and ever more steadfast in my mistaken beliefs, and because of that, my level of enjoyment, diminished. The horrors. 😉 All the best, Nonoise |
rdwv: maybe in your time you ran into Bill Kenney who wrote this:http://www.tempoelectric.com/Wire_and_Cable_Facts.pdf One can reasonably extract from his findings that what connectors and RCA jacks can do a signal can do the exact same thing to wires once differences are introduced (different metallurgy, alloys, coatings, dielectrics, etc.) I find it funny that those who adhere to strict measurements always discount the smaller differences in measurements or who cite even smaller, extraneous phenomena as the reason. It's a great fallback position. I've always trusted my ears, even when I hear a difference. I've never had the occasion to doubt my senses until coming upon sites like this, only to realize that fundamentalists exist in all manner of discipline, and to treat them with caution, like I do with all the other disciplines. All the best, Nonoise |
It would seem that even in a high-end forum site such as this, discussions from others from other sites with an agenda devolve into childish attacks. Lots of psychological tricks being played here....... It goes both ways. Do any of you from that other site honestly believe you're the first to raise your points? Do you think that your appeals to authority, name dropping and your credentials intimidate in any way, shape or form? Please cite the "law of science" that states there is no break in without conflating it with a law that predicts a measurement. And don't forget to omit the other subsets of said laws that say otherwise when it does pertain to sound; that are still debated to this very day by real scientists and engineers who take the time to deliberate. All the best, Nonoise |
Another way to facilitate burn in is to use a CD test/break in treatment like Ayre's Irrational but Efficacious CD Treatment. I can get impatient with break in and plopping the CD in and letting it run for an hour or two on repeat can greatly speed up the break in process. Before and after can be a real eye & ear opener. After hearing the results, I now do it 2-3 times with playing CDs in between to any new component I get. All the best, Nonoise |
