Okay, How Important Is Speaker Break In? (Dynaudio Contour 60i)

Speaker break in/burn in can be fairly significant.  The suspensions need to flex to loosen up, and good caps can take many hours to burn in.  The first several hours tend to make the most dramatic difference.  I used to place new speakers face down on the floor, crank em up, close the door, and let them thump for a few hours.

I still vividly remember my present day loudspeakers when I took them out of the box and plug them in they didn’t sound very good. I had live demoed these speakers at the dealers so I knew what they were capable of. It took upwards of 400 hours until the speakers settled in and then it was night and day by that time

The assertion that all gear (particularly speakers with mechanically moving parts) must sound fantastic straight out of the box or you need to immediately send them back to the manufacturer/dealer is ridiculous.  Particularly among higher-end speakers where many of the differences between brands at similar price points can be quite nuanced - this is important if you're thinking of making a change to coax some sonics out of your system that are more desirable.  In audiophile terms we aren't just talking "does this sound good or does this sound bad?" and then act on that to exercise return policies.  It's about giving the speakers a chance the perform at their best so better listening comparisons can be made to inform our buying decisions.

When I first acquired my Devore O/96's with the intention of replacing my Spendor D7's it was clear cold out of the box that the O/96's didn't sound as good as the D7's that I had been using for years.  John Devore even states that his speakers will take 600 hrs to fully run in and can benefit incrementally up to 1,000 hrs.  I found the sonics in the O/96's to improve over the D7's at about 100 hrs and smoked them by 200 hrs.  All the while the 0/96's never sounded "bad" from day 1 - they simply didn't sound better.  Should I have returned them? lol That would have been a tragic mistake as they now have close to 1,000 hrs an amaze me every day.  It's a mere matter of physics - the speakers benefitted greatly from loosening up the huge foam surrounds and spiders on the 10-inch woofer.  While not all speakers require the same run-in time to coax the best sound from them, these categorical statements about immediately returning them are utter nonsense.

Takes about a week of playing at listening levels. 

Also, before you keep going on your merry-go-round, having good room acoustics will make a lot more speakers sound good in your room.

I agree with a lot of what is been said above, if it does not sound remotely close to what you would like initially, no amount of break in will help.

honestly, you should’ve stuck with a new Bowers.