Break In Question?

The Break In Debate has been going on for many years. Choose your sides..

Many pieces of equipment, and not just in the Audio World break in over time. Can it be measured? I doubt it. Does it occur? yes. IMHO.

I truly believe it is a real change condition, not just imagined. As has been stated before, perhaps we do not have the proper equipment to measure it. But I can hear it, feel it, recognize it, etc.

If you don’t experience it, or don’t believe it, I guess count yourself lucky to not have to chase this dragon.

ozzy

This is the silliest thing to argue over. It makes no difference what your position on the matter is because it will resolve itself automatically. If a manufacturer recommends 100 hours break in, for example, once the 100 hours are up, that's it. What difference does it make? Its not like you have to do some type of active process that can be screwed up if you don't get it right. 

xmbw4, it makes a difference psychologically and materially. Break in is used by many dealers as an encouragement to either accept a product which is not impressive in demo and/or to hold a purchased product longer in the hopes that you get used to it and like it. 

In my book The Audiophile Laws I discuss the many issues/problems of break in and how to avoid it all. Giving credence to break in is an impediment to advancing a system. 

If break-in was simply brains adjusting to a changing sonic signature, how could we discern the effect of any change in a system with constancy? In other words, to be able to discern any change in our environment, we must have a reasonable constant–which is our brain. If the brain was adapting to every alteration in the environment, we would lose points of sense reference and end up in an amorphous stew of uncertainty. 

Let's not let this go too far off the rails. Break-in is real, completely repeatable and obvious unless you do not possess good listening skills or a sufficiently resolving system. I have broken in dozens of components, and cables over the last fifty years. 

One of the more interesting experiences was that I was able to break in three Audio Research Reference 160 amps. Each of which I had for over 1,000 hours. To my amazement the sequence was exactly the same on each case. Starting trebly and a bit flat and improving through about 120 hours, then wavering wildly between sounding terrible and great... before resuming a slow improvement through 600 hours. 

A unique characteristic of the Audio Research Reference 5SE after breaking was that after each turn on / starting to play music from cold  there would be a very notable jump in fidelity at about fifteen minutes... but if you turned it on without playing music... you still had to play music through it for fifteen minutes before the improvement occurred. I thought it was interesting. Then I saw someone on a forum bring up the very same characteristic. And another owner jumped in and confirmed. The Audio Research 6 / SE does not do this. It sounds great from startup there is no jump in fidelity... other than a very small one. 

I could relate stories about dozens of components and wires that I have broken in over the years. So, let's not get too carried away that it doesn't exist or it's in your head. I've been comparing notes with people with good listening skills and systems for decades and never met with anyone who could not hear it on most good equipment. The degree and details does vary by component. Many components are run long and hard before sale. But there is still typically a break in period. I just recently received a fully broking in amp that sounded terrible for the first day...then was fine again.