[BJS]

I'd like to know if it's possible to break-in headphones too much.
I recently got myself a new pair of dt931. In order to tame its brightness, I used CoolEdit to create 5hz and 35000hz sine waves, plug my dt931 into SB live to play those wav files and some pink noises at the highest volume for 4 days.

The sound softened a bit and became more smoothly at the end
of day 3. However, at the end of day 4, the sound drastically
changed. Although no volume change, the highs excessively recessed, and the bass began to sound boomy, relaxed, and not so tight any more. On the whole, it became a lot warmer(darker?) and more forgiving to bad recordings. (a loss of detail?)

I also have a pair of MS-1 and Elite 840. Before break-in, the highs of dt931 stands between them but is closer to MS-1. Now, it still stands between them but is closer to Elite 840. They still sound nice to me, yet in a completely different way, not so clean and exciting anymore, but warm and bass heavy.

I'm worried that I broke-in my dt931 the wrong way and has caused damage to them. I'd like to figure out whether I screw up the mechanical parts or it's normal for dt931 to sound this way after broken-in.

 

[Snufkin]

Hm.. I certainly wouldn't use test tones to burn in any of my headphones, I found that normal music works extremely well, and certainly not at max volume (at least not from a headphone amp) for 4 days...

The important thing is how they sound to you - if they now sound bad, that's not a good thing, is it?

Then again, SBLive certainly isn't the best source for the DT931s, a better soundcard (santa cruz) and a headphone amp would improve the sound significantly.

 

[dknightd]

Originally posted by BJS
I'd like to know if it's possible to break-in headphones too much.

As long as you didn't break them, or, wear them out you should be OK

I recently got myself a new pair of dt931. In order to tame its brightness, I used CoolEdit to create 5hz and 35000hz sine waves, plug my dt931 into SB live to play those wav files and some pink noises at the highest volume for 4 days.

Ouch!!! Were you trying to break them?!?!?!?
Is this a troll??? Does "cool edit" really let
you try to make a 35khz signal...

I recommend next time you just plug your headphones
into a mains wall outlet, it'll take less time to break you phones that way. geez

 

[Joe Bloggs]

A 35000kHz sine wave shouldn't 'break' the phones...

It's certainly possible that you've damaged the drivers through overexcursion while playing the 5Hz tone, though...

OTOH I wonder if the SBLive card had enough power to do this.

Of course headphones can be over-broken in, it all depends on what you did to them, right? Like dknightd says, if you plug the phones somehow into the mains power supply... now *that's* over-break-in...

Question is, of course, whether what *you* have done constitutes over-break-in...

How loud was it at 'maximum volume'? Could you bear to put them on your head? An inch away from your head? A metre away?

Since all the tones you used were either supersonic or subsonic, though, it doesn't mean that you are safe even if you couldn't hear anything while they were breaking in. However, any sound that you might have got to hear would have been all distortion, and if the distortion alone got so loud you couldn't put them on your ears, that would have been a good sign that you were doing something seriously terrible to your cans...

At any rate, don't act as though the harder you break in your phones, the better they will sound...

 

[meatman]

Actually I would hazard a guess that you damaged the voice coil. Remember that normal music is NOTHING like a test tone, and repeated excursion at a certain frequency at high volume could very well have overheated the voicecoil and changed the way it responds to input or even deformed it. After all, headphones are nothing more than miniature speakers, and what you describe could certainly do some damage. IMHO I would've used pink noise to break them in, that would have been much safer as it is made up of all frequencies, and not just one. Hope the 'phones are under warranty!

 

[Xevion]

Just an FYI: The 35Khz tone wasn't playing back at all, the Live is incapable of anything over 22.1Khz.

That said, 5Hz at max volume? For 4 days straight? Sounds like you damaged the drivers.

 

[pedxing]

Yeah, sounds like you broke your headphones. The SB card is not exactly clean output either. I wouldn't be surprise the card would have transient spikes in the signal that can damage the drivers over time.

Some people use to say that connecting the first sound blaster cards to a home stereo system was dangerous because the output had a lot of harsh distortion that can damage the speakers. Over time, the speakers performance degrade from these strange artifacts in the signal.

I burn my headphones only with rock and classical music at reasonable volume levels.

 

[MirandaX]

Yes, it's possible that you damaged your headphones.

Don't burn in your headphones by playing a single frequency sound for a long time! You risk damaging them.

Every material has a resonant frequency (some more than others). If you play a single frequency for burn in, you run the risk of the frequency you're using being very close to the resonant frequency of some part of the headphones. If it's the shell, you're fine. If it's the diaphragm or suspension, you run the risk of damage. Basically, being close to the resonant frequency causes higher amplitude vibrations than the cans are designed to handle. In some cases (especially lightly damped systems like the diaphragm), these vibrations can have extremely high amplitudes. This is the main reason why bridges fall down during earthquakes (not structural damage, as you might suspect).

The low frequency sound you played is particularly risky. The high frequency sound was probably okay.

 

[Clubkill]

I know that I was beifly testing my new phones (hp890) at ultra-low frequencies using a sound synthesis program (Csound). At certanain sub-audio frequencies (13 hz for example) I got some strange artifacting very high in pitch. Lower frequencies had similar problems to a lesser degree. I am not sure whether it was from the source or the phones, but it did not sound good.

I think that burning them the way they are intended t be used (i.e. music and all stuff in the audible range) is the only sensible way to do it. Even though companies claim that the headphones can handle a frequency like 5 htz, they certainly aren't designed for prolonged use like that.

*speculation below*

If you think about the mechanics of it, at low frquency signals the drivers are being pushed for longer periods of time(i.e. kept from equilibreum, and not being moved at anywhere close to their natural frequency. I imagine that this can sloppy them up and account for the looser bass (but plenty boomt) bass.

 

[x1lexure]

What would you guys say is the best all around way of burning in a headphone?

(I have heard so many things from Pink noise to just the radio. And are there any guides online about it?)

 

[gloco]

I don't understand why anyone even bothers trying to figure out "how to break them in." Just wear the damn things and listen to your tunes, they'll eventually open up, are you in a rush for greatness or something?

 

[Snufkin]

First and foremost: YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BURN IN YOUR HEADPHONES.

It is an option, not a must.

Personally I don't want to damage my headphones, so my burn-in process involves taking a cd from my collection that has a good range on it, putting the headphones on my head, turning them up to just above as loud as I'd like to listen to them, stick the cd on repeat, take them off my head, go to bed in the evening, wake up in the morning, stop cd and listen normally from there.

I actually enjoy hearing new headphones change over time, but I also often don't like the "out of the box" sound of most that I've heard.

There's no magic formula for burning in, you're not going to get an orpheus out of your streetstyles just by burning them in for a week straight with "Snufs magic headphone test tone"

 

[LarryS]

Quote:

Originally posted by x1lexure What would you guys say is the best all around way of burning in a headphone? (I have heard so many things from Pink noise to just the radio. And are there any guides online about it?)

The only online info I've seen has been at Jan Meier's web site: http://www.meier-audio.com/

Scroll down the left until you see headphone tricks. It follows pretty closely what a lot of people here have recommended.

I recently burned in a new pair of HD-600's. I'd played a few different cd's and noticed the biggest change after about 24 hours of playing Holst's The Planets. There's a wide dynamic range in that CD and it really woke up the bass in the headphones. There was an immediate difference...even to my inexperienced ears.

 

[setmenu]

Hi
When i test my diy phones with LF sign waves and watch that
diaphragm boy can it move!
I am very carefull with this you will get maximuim current etc this way and at 5HZ full power for 3 days

!!!

Definitely not good!


Setmenu

 

[phesoy]

Don't forget the startup time for the rest of the equipment. All components in your set are selected due to the warm-caracter, the difference is noticable with a good set of headphones or speakers. My set requires at least two hours of warmup if not used and my NAD got a Class A pre-amp!

Keep also in mind that the membrane might need some time to soften if you haven't used the headphone for a while.

About driving headphones with soundblaster:

My guess is that the same goes for headphones as for loudspeakers. When driven at high gain and little power the clipping can ruin a high-quality loudspeaker in minutes.

Most modern speakerelements can deal with massive load eg. Vifa 6.5" mid/bass elements could handle peakloads of 220w. But they can't handle clipping from a 20W output! I guess the same goes for headphones. (ref. NAD soft clipping circuit that is claimed to save speakers when gain/power ratio is too low by smooth-clipping)

The danger with clipping is quite intuitive. When the amps power fail to drive the cone all the way along with the signal the cone and signal goes out of phase.

If you really need to use your expensive headphones for mp3:s, try a external D/A konverter (stereo-link 1200, Onkyo U-Something) or make CD:s of wav:s to make sure you get a good signal! AND DON'T USE MP3 by the way, most of them is encoded with a bad encoder such as Xing or Lame with std. settings, try to get the ogg format above release candidate 3 or higher.

Note, I'm not an expert at this area these are just my own conclusions.