[SoundTown]

To K612 owners, I have a question: what's your experience with burn-in on these?
I've demoed the K612 twice. Once last year, a second time yesterday.
My initial impression was that the headphones had a really wide sound stage that extended beyond the cups, with a oh so slight splashy-ness in the upper mids that was difficult to ignore after about 3+ minutes of my demo. The demo pair seemed well-used, with the elastic bands slightly loosened and the pads worn in.
The second time yesterday at a different store was with a demo unit that seems rather fresh/unused. That store doesn't really promote their availability of AKG, so they don't mobilise a lot of units of the brand's products (only pre-order, no stock on-hand). Result: not many people demo the K612 there. The elastic band was significantly tighter, pads were stiffer, and there was even the brand new product factory smell. This time, I was stunned with how much smoother the sound was, and how intimate the sound stage was. I had demoed the K701 and K702 right before the K612, and I'd say they all felt relatively close in sound stage, which is to say not cramped, but close to the ear cup.
I'm not sure if my impressions are considered reliable, but I just want to throw it out there to see what owners can tell me. Do you feel that burn-in has "opened up" your K612's sound stage, and did the upper mids receive a rise in emphasis after some time as well? Am fascinated by how different my two personal listening tests were on this headphone.

 

[thelonious58]

To K612 owners, I have a question: what's your experience with burn-in on these?
I've demoed the K612 twice. Once last year, a second time yesterday.
My initial impression was that the headphones had a really wide sound stage that extended beyond the cups, with a oh so slight splashy-ness in the upper mids that was difficult to ignore after about 3+ minutes of my demo. The demo pair seemed well-used, with the elastic bands slightly loosened and the pads worn in.
The second time yesterday at a different store was with a demo unit that seems rather fresh/unused. That store doesn't really promote their availability of AKG, so they don't mobilise a lot of units of the brand's products (only pre-order, no stock on-hand). Result: not many people demo the K612 there. The elastic band was significantly tighter, pads were stiffer, and there was even the brand new product factory smell. This time, I was stunned with how much smoother the sound was, and how intimate the sound stage was. I had demoed the K701 and K702 right before the K612, and I'd say they all felt relatively close in sound stage, which is to say not cramped, but close to the ear cup.
I'm not sure if my impressions are considered reliable, but I just want to throw it out there to see what owners can tell me. Do you feel that burn-in has "opened up" your K612's sound stage, and did the upper mids receive a rise in emphasis after some time as well? Am fascinated by how different my two personal listening tests were on this headphone.

A very interesting post! The K612 is quite difficult to judge in terms of burn-in for two reasons;
1. There is a significant variation in samples for some reason only known to AKG
2. To judge burn-in you would have to listen to the same track over a period of time rather than just listening to random tracks, because the K612 sounds very different on various tracks, unlike for example a Sennheiser HD598 which always seems to have a warm sound and an upper bass hump.
My conclusion - buy a pair of K612​ and discover how wonderful they are and what a superb bargain they are too. If ever a great headphone went under the radar, it's the k612!
Hope this helps

 

[xeizo]

K612 gets smoother with better amplification rather than burn-in, they can sound really awesome with the right gear.

 

[siberianmoon]

  To K612 owners, I have a question: what's your experience with burn-in on these?

It's probably got more to do with what you had for breakfast that day.

 

[SoundTown]

  It's probably got more to do with what you had for breakfast that day.

 

If you must know, the answer’s savoury Chinese pancakes with anchovies and onions.
On a slightly more serious note, I was just very curious because I took notes on my first impression and it was starkly different from my second one. I’m actually kind of inclined to believe in the product variation + amp used  explanations personally. Just threw in burn-in as a thought since the only changed variable was how new the headphones were. Source was the same (Fiio Q1).

 

[SoundTown]

A very interesting post! The K612 is quite difficult to judge in terms of burn-in for two reasons;
1. There is a significant variation in samples for some reason only known to AKG
2. To judge burn-in you would have to listen to the same track over a period of time rather than just listening to random tracks, because the K612 sounds very different on various tracks, unlike for example a Sennheiser HD598 which always seems to have a warm sound and an upper bass hump.
My conclusion - buy a pair of K612​ and discover how wonderful they are and what a superb bargain they are too. If ever a great headphone went under the radar, it's the k612!
Hope this helps

 
Yes I think your explanation makes sense, definitely believable. Regarding point #2 though, one of the tracks I reverted to when I realised how different the second K612 sounded was "Shake it Off", which I distinctly remember testing on my first demo at the other store. Sound was still different. I will admit, however, that bass in particular did have some varying characteristics depending on which track I played, which I thought was weird (perhaps it's just very uneven as well).
In any case, I'm probably not going to get the K612, but might recommend it to gamers especially.

 

[SoundTown]

K612 gets smoother with better amplification rather than burn-in, they can sound really awesome with the right gear.

 
That's actually a pretty plausible explanation as well. Perhaps I'll try a different store next time to test the K612 + IFI iCan SE if I ever get the urge to demo it again. Would you reckon the K712 would be similarly 'dependent' on an amp?

 

[siberianmoon]

   

If you must know, the answer’s savoury Chinese pancakes with anchovies and onions.
On a slightly more serious note, I was just very curious because I took notes on my first impression and it was starkly different from my second one. I’m actually kind of inclined to believe in the product variation + amp used  explanations personally. Just threw in burn-in as a thought since the only changed variable was how new the headphones were. Source was the same (Fiio Q1).

It just makes no sense to claim that a pair headphones sound different because you listened to them once before a year earlier. I wouldn't care even if you claimed the first listening happened just a few hours earlier. Your perception of the sound alone will change depending on so many factors, starting from how noisy your trip to the shop was, how were you feeling, time of the day and whatnot.
 
Dynamic headphones don't change from A to Z over a little period of wear, you know. If there is any difference, you would have to work for it comparing the two pairs side-by-side. Still there are more relevant factors like issues in quality control and even how you position the headphones on your head, how long your hair was (because it also changes the position) etc. And I am not even a believer in amps nor cables nor magic pixies, so all that was excluded.

 

[SoundTown]

  It just makes no sense to claim that a pair headphones sound different because you listened to them once before a year earlier. I wouldn't care even if you claimed the first listening happened just a few hours earlier. Your perception of the sound alone will change depending on so many factors, starting from how noisy your trip to the shop was, how were you feeling, time of the day and whatnot.
 
Dynamic headphones don't change from A to Z over a little period of wear, you know. If there is any difference, you would have to work for it comparing the two pairs side-by-side. Still there are more relevant factors like issues in quality control and even how you position the headphones on your head, how long your hair was (because it also changes the position) etc. And I am not even a believer in amps nor cables nor magic pixies, so all that was excluded.

 

Look I hope I’m not being contrived here, but let me just clarify where I stand:
1)      Yes, my observations are not accurate. I’m not an objective test rig that can reliably conjur perfect listening scenarios.
2)      Yes, I will 100% agree with you that hair length, headphone positioning, QC consistency, and lots of other environmental factors will affect the way the headphones sound.
3)      Do I actually believe in burn-in? I don’t know, because there’s many other factors that are hard to control when comparing an older and newer unit. That said, I will stand by mental acclamation to a headphone’s sound signature.
I hope my intention wasn’t misconstrued – all I did was walk into a headphone store on two separate occasions, happen to have different experiences, and am trying to ask the community if anyone’s has had varying experiences while owning the headphone. I’m not going to spend SGD $400+ just to test, as you mentioned, a senseless hypothesis just based on a small, insignificant, unreliable, subjective perception.
Furthermore, let’s put it this way. Subjective opinions, though not sensible to rely on for all your decision making, are the only ways you can make sense of the things you try and do. If I test drove a BMW 10 years ago and commented, “I thought the suspension on that particular car was kind of rough.” Then I tried another car, same model, and said, “Wow I remember 10 years ago when I test drove this car model, the leather cushions were a lot less stiff.”
Are this test driver’s statements representative of the whole truth? Probably not. Memory is an iffy thing. But We still talk about our experiences with cars, and here we talk about our experiences with headphones. There's only so many other ways I can understand a headphone without having to buy it.
If we really must make my motivation clear, here it is: I made a perceived observation, and want to make conversation to learn more about this hobby, as is the purpose of user forums like Head-Fi.
I hope no harm was done.

 

[kman1211]

  To K612 owners, I have a question: what's your experience with burn-in on these?
I've demoed the K612 twice. Once last year, a second time yesterday.
My initial impression was that the headphones had a really wide sound stage that extended beyond the cups, with a oh so slight splashy-ness in the upper mids that was difficult to ignore after about 3+ minutes of my demo. The demo pair seemed well-used, with the elastic bands slightly loosened and the pads worn in.
The second time yesterday at a different store was with a demo unit that seems rather fresh/unused. That store doesn't really promote their availability of AKG, so they don't mobilise a lot of units of the brand's products (only pre-order, no stock on-hand). Result: not many people demo the K612 there. The elastic band was significantly tighter, pads were stiffer, and there was even the brand new product factory smell. This time, I was stunned with how much smoother the sound was, and how intimate the sound stage was. I had demoed the K701 and K702 right before the K612, and I'd say they all felt relatively close in sound stage, which is to say not cramped, but close to the ear cup.
I'm not sure if my impressions are considered reliable, but I just want to throw it out there to see what owners can tell me. Do you feel that burn-in has "opened up" your K612's sound stage, and did the upper mids receive a rise in emphasis after some time as well? Am fascinated by how different my two personal listening tests were on this headphone.

I've owned two K612's, one Austrian and one Chinese and have directly compared them. The Austrian pair had a lot more body to it's sound and the bass impact was far greater, the Chinese one was shrill and thin sounding, I think something was wrong with it. In my experience the 2khz boost actually reduced over time and the body and bass increased over time. But I had a weird example on my Austrian K612 where it had horrible bass distortion that went away with use, now it's impossible to distort that headphone essentially. I had a similar thing happen to my Beyer Amiron Home but to a lesser degree. 

 

[siberianmoon]

I would return the headphones for that distortion, because it's bound to come back some time. Especially Beyerdynamics are – in my books – notorius for having drivers break up like that.

 

[kman1211]

I would return the headphones for that distortion, because it's bound to come back some time. Especially Beyerdynamics are – in my books – notorius for having drivers break up like that.

The AKG is over 2 years old now and it never came back after the couple weeks it took to get rid of it, it was a gift so I was unable to return it. And the Amirons it's completely gone as well and I've had them for a while, the Amirons are under warranty if it ever shows up again but I haven't had even a hint of it after it went away, same as the K612. The odd them about both of them the distortion was equal and even on both drivers breaking up at the same exact points. Usually when I have a truly defective headphone it's on one side predominately.

 

[interface95]

To the burn-in question again:

What does actually change over time and also has impact on the sound even more than most think are the pads.
They get softer after time, your ear gets closer to the ear and in my opinion the sound overall also changes.

Noticable when you buy new pads for your headphone.
On the hd580/600 for example I like the sound of worn pads more than of new ones.

 

[Deftone]

I did not hear any burn in changes even after 400 hours, they sounded great from the get go but i will say the pads were very uncomfortable and hard at first, even though i asked if they soften with use and many people told me no. They are actually much softer and a lot more comfy now.

 

[Mad Max]

I've owned two K612's, one Austrian and one Chinese and have directly compared them. The Austrian pair had a lot more body to it's sound and the bass impact was far greater, the Chinese one was shrill and thin sounding, I think something was wrong with it. In my experience the 2khz boost actually reduced over time and the body and bass increased over time. But I had a weird example on my Austrian K612 where it had horrible bass distortion that went away with use, now it's impossible to distort that headphone essentially. I had a similar thing happen to my Beyer Amiron Home but to a lesser degree.

Your hairs or other foreign objects getting onto the driver diaphragms can do that.