How to Break In a new CD Transport?

A CD transport does in fact have output stages, digital output stages of course, to drive the digital outputs. And for balanced AES/EBU and coaxial S/PDIF the output stages must in fact be particularly robust, able to drive 110 ohm and 75 ohm loads respectively.

While I wouldn’t want to speculate on whether it would make any difference, you may want to consider breaking the unit in with a 75 ohm termination ($2.39) connected to the BNC output, and/or an identical termination connected to the RCA output via an RCA-to-BNC adapter ($1.49).

Offhand I don’t know of any comparably inexpensive means of terminating the AES/EBU output, unless you want to create one yourself using a 110 ohm resistor and an XLR connector.

Also, for that matter, since per the manual all four of the outputs of this transport are apparently simultaneously active it ***might*** provide some sonic benefit if you were to permanently apply a termination to whichever of those outputs you are not using when you put the unit to actual use. That would prevent signals on the unused output connectors from reflecting back into the unit. Which the high frequency components of digital audio signals would do to a potentially significant degree if the connectors are left unterminated, conceivably resulting in the signal reflections coupling to some degree to unintended internal circuit points, with unpredictable consequences.

I have no thoughts on how or if the I2S via HDMI output should be treated with respect to these issues.

Enjoy the new equipment! Regards,
-- Al

Made me laugh! Output stage on a transport - oops, my bad. I might not have made that clear in original post. Sorry Millercarbon.Hey reubent, can't argue with keepin it simple.

It's a Transport only. It doesn't have an output stage.

For the life of me, I can't understand why a transport (not a CD Player) would need significant break-in. If it were me, I would listen to music as I had time, and I wouldn't worry about break-in. And this is coming from a guy who does believe in break-in and leaves his system powered-up 24/7.

Thanks for your response, excellent information. A heck of a lot easier to get to 20 hrs. than 400!!
I misspoke about all tubes - the Dac is SS.How does that change the situation? Leave DAC on then play cd. That will give Load and exercise output stage? Everything else off?Thanks for the help.

It sounds really nice which is what you want because 400 hrs is BS. The vast majority is done in 10 to 20 hours, by 50 for sure. Anything after that is in the realm of normal daily variations. That said you should leave it on but not bother playing anything unless you're actually listening. Leaving on will benefit everything except the output stage which needs a load. So if your DAC is also tube based and you don't want to leave it on you could put a 20k or 50k Ohm resistor across the transport outs. But I would just leave it on.