Do WBT spades need break in?


OK - I know I sound like a crazy audiophile.  

I bought new WBT spades to replace my old school banana connects from about 5 years ago.  I just acquired a pair of kef reference 1's and the old bananas fit poorly and were not in line with the quality of the speakers.  I removed the old connects, fit the WBT's and screwed the wire in tight.

They sounds a bit hollow and confused.  Is there such a thing as spade break in?
Using harmonic tech pro11 cables.  Hegel h360 amp.  

Thoughts?


cshadow

Showing 1 response by mkgus

I realize I’m a bit late to the party. Thought I’d share some recent experiences. I have recently made a number of DC power cables to go between a preamp and a power supply. At the same time I have been swapping interconnects around. What I have noticed every time is that the sound is off after making new connections. Imaging is most noticeable with instruments taking up too much of the sound stage and being too in your face and with an odd sort of “phase” issue that sounds very unnatural. There is another effect where piano notes and stringed instruments have weird overtones that make them sound a bit harsh to the ears. Each key strike comes with a slight insult to your ears. After several hours of letting my system play, this all seems to go away. The most noticeable aspect is that the instruments become more pinpoint and move back in the soundstage. That harsh sound with piano keys and stringed instruments clears up. This all happens in under a day of playing. There may be a longer, more gentle break-in process still going on, but I find the first 4-6 hours to be especially noticeable and required before the music sounds right enough to happily listen and stop worrying that you made the wrong cable decisions. If things don’t sound right after a few days, then I begin to worry and consider my next steps.