Do cables really need "breaking in"?

You know, telling someone who is attempting to have a cordial conversation with someone else, and not trying to sell anything to him or anyone else is rather juvenile, i.e., childish and rude. The question was: do cables improve with breaking-in through use. I am one of those who say no, based on (1) the absence of any published evidence to the contrary, and (2) my own experience with cables. I'm getting on, and have a bit of experience.

I do not use $15 cables. I actually have some $10 interconnects from Radio Shack that are adequate for some applications, and I play with them sometimes to see if my opinion changes, but I don't use them in my hifi system. I do use rather inexpensive interconnects made by a pro audio gear company that I prefer to every other interconnect Ive listened to (well "broken-in" demos from my friendly hifi dealer). I use AQ Crystal speaker cables in my main system (that's my $ limit - 18 ft run can be very expensive) which I chose after rejecting several other name brands, e.g., AlphaCore, Kimber, Nordost, MIT.

So, you see, I do think cables sound different enough to make a meaningful choice. Must be my imagination.

But, based on my own experience, I don't think the sound of a cable changes through use, which was the question above. Of course, I'm probably just imagining that nothing is happening.

This in not "hearsay." I report my own first hand experience. "Hearsay" is if you say that my friend Joe says his system is much better now that he has the Valhalla. Now, can I say my preferred interconnects are just as good as the Valhalla? Of course not. I have never heard the Valhalla, and probably never will.

Other people say that they perceive a difference in the sound of their cables through use. Fine.

If one is concerned that he may unwittingly learn to live with an unacceptable cable that he thinks has burned in because he got used to it, the solution is simple: burn it in without listening to it. Ask the dealer how many hours, then feed a signal through it for that long before listening to it. Don't allow yourself to get used to it before it's adequately "broken in."

Apart from needlessly insulting other participants here, Sean says that breaking-in through use doesn't really get the job done, that you need to use a cable cooker of some sort. I have nothing to say about cable cookers because I have never used one. I don't know what they do to a cable. If they change the sound of the cable, I wouldnt have any idea how or why, or whether it would be an improvement. I dont talk about things that I dont know about.

Here's a quote: "i think that most folks would consider increased clarity, smoothness, transparency, detail, improved harmonic structure and a more natural presentation GOOD things."

Yes, no doubt, if that's what they perceive. Problem is without objective referents for those words, no one really knows what, if anything real, you are describing. The level of abstraction is too far removed from the actual event. If you're having fun, that's nice.

Matt, cables do need to break in, for about 10 seconds. Consider, if cables need to burn in, what changes? And if you say they sound fine after, say 50 hours, do they stop changing by some miracle or do they keep burning out?

For those who believe in DBX tests, there have been none, zero, to prove that wires benefit from any sort of burn in. For those who prefer anecdotes, many of us have never noticed a change in a cable from brand new to broken in. Many say they have. This is one cable dispute to which I think there is an answer. You simply have to decide which group is delusional, the group that thinks nothing's changed or the group that thinks something happened.

This burn in argument offered by retailers of cables is the best argument I know of for the proposition that cables sound different from one another. If they all sounded alike, none of them would have anything objectionable about their sound to get used to during the "break-in" period.

I meant to say "saying 'put up or shut' to someone" or "telling someone to 'put up or shut up'" was rude. Still is, even after the apology.

I was just thinking how nice it was to have two recent threads, do cables sound different and how do you a/b cables, wherein some people could say "DBX" and other people could say "Cable X floats my boat and Cable Y sounds like mud,' and nobody called anyone else an idiot or a fraud. At AA, you cant say "DBX." And at Audioreview or rao, you can't say you like one cable better than another without being subjected to ridicule.

For a trained ee to say "wire is wire and I'm going to use 12 gauge stranded or Romex, and you are all wasting your time" is a perfectly valid point of view. He isnt trying to sell you anything. He's trying to save you some money and maybe debunk what he considers to be a fraud on the consuming public. You don't have to take his word for it. Go play with cables. And he doesnt need to waste his time playing with cables to test his learning. If you want to do that, as I have, that's fine too.

Now, if that ee says you're an idiot or a fraud, that's different. That's not nice either.

The other issue is the words people use around here to describe what they hear from their components and cables, and from "burning-in" cables, are marketing words learned from the trade (and yes, I include the "reviewers" for the buff mags as part of the trade). The more I hear, the more I want to go down to the hardware store and buy some zipcord.