Burn In = Voodoo?


I have been an obsessive and enthusiastic audiophile for 20 years, I am not averse to tweaking and The Audio Critic infuriates me. However, I must admit I get a little uncomfortable reading so many posts about "burn in". While I understand that amps may need to warm up, speaker components may need to loosen up, the idea of burning in a cable or say, an SACD player just seems ludicrous to me. Unless of course, the party suggesting the burn in is a snake oil equipment peddlar and needs to make sure someone owns and uses your product for a couple of months before they decide it's really no good. At that point, of course, no one could actually remember what it sounded like in the first place and even if you wanted to return it, it would be too late. Am I being too cynical here?
cwlondon
Jostler, would you mind doing an experiment:
Step one: Listen to your system with music, you know well.
Step two: Without detaching your wires from you gear, i.e. ic's, speaker- and power cables, lift them up, shake them vigorously, place them differently to where they were before. The greater the difference the better.
Step three: Immediatedly after that, listen to the same piece of music as before.
Step four: Tell us about what you perceived.

I agree, it has nothing to do with burning in new gear, rather with your contention, as I perceive it, that nothing happens to the wire, once it is hooked on. I don't mean to be imposing in any way, I'm just suggesting you do, what I once was told myself, because I was of the same opinion as you are now. Man, was I flabberghasted by the result.
J k thank-you for your insite and understanding of wire. The explanation you gave is the same one I've heard too, and it does indeed make sense to me.
Trelja, thank-you for your comments on absolute zero. I tend to not need alot of the physics and calc. I got in school, and absolute zero never seems to come up in design meetings. I thought I remembered it as you stated. I also thought that absolute zero is physically impossible. I thought I remembered that once atomic motion has ceased, the matter it self would fall apart. Am I wrong? J.D.
Detlof: Shaking a wire affects the sound? Come on, now. If that were true the phone company couldn't hang telephone wires in the wind. Your little experiment would prove only that I'm suggestible, which I'll admit I am. And you, my friend, sound very suggestible.

By the way, there's one case where your experiment could have a positive result. If the current placement of your wires causes some form of interference, repositioning them could alleviate that. But that has nothing to do with a physical change inside the wires.
There are molecular changes when current runs though a component or cable. There molecules do not immediately change back as soon as you turn something off. If you took a burned-in component or cable, removed it from the system and put it the closet for a couple months, you may find you need to burn it in again.
J_K : Stan Warren did a test with audiophile friends at a university, where identicle cables were frozen in Nitrogen (-273 degrees), Dry Ice (-100 degrees), and no freezing. An unintereted party knew which cable were which. The panel was able to identify the never frozen cables quickly each time (did not sound as good). They could not identify which cables were frozen in Nitrogen or Dry Ice. Therefore, they concluded Dry Ice is good enough and anyone could do it at home. They did further tests and came up with -83 degrees as the magic number you need to pass to get the full benefits of freezing. I got this information first person talking with Stan (Stan Warren for those who do not know him, is Supermods, Superphon and the "S" in PS Audio.