[dacavalcante]

First of all, hi to everybody! I'm new here and this is my first post... sorry about any English mistake, I'm not American...
Ok, I've been reading head-fi forum for a week now... And I realized a lot of people don't believe on burn in... Let me tell you my experiences...
I used to build subwoofers boxes for my car, and usually 4th order band pass boxes.... some subwoofers in the beginning used to make some very strange noise (like breaking), on higher volumes.... pass some 3 months, they were playing very well at higher volumes, no strange noise.... psychological ? I don't think so....
Ok, now the headphones... This week I bought a Senn Hd-555..... my old one was a Philips HP250 (pretty bad, hum ?)... ok, I had them for 2 years....
For my surprise, senn 555 didn't sound so superior at the moment I plugged it.... except for a little more detail on instruments and bigger bass extension..... ( I thought, it must be my onboard soundcard Realtek 97.... ok folks, I'm just beginning, gonna work on that later), but after 3 days listening for 10 or more hours the senn 555..... big surprise, differences in sound a getting bigger and bigger.... All my roommates (that don't use them), couldn't tell the difference, either, in the beginning, but now, they say there is a lot of difference between the two headphones...
So I think the physical effect is as big as the psychological one....
You can't tell the difference between two expensive phones is one thing.... but between a very cheap one and another much better, can't be psychological at all....
Before you guys say "it's because you had a very "bad sound" parameter", I had already heard home mid-fi and hi-fi systems, and I sure can realize their big difference from stock market ones....

OBS: I'm using flac and ape recordings of chescky and reference records to hear differences... on mp3, it's almost the same "quality".... =]

I hope get some opinions on that...!!

 

[Veggie_Musician]

I believe IEMs burn in... dispite what people on this board claims - I trust my ears and have 4 degree's in music!

 

[MaZa]

I believe in both physical (only few hours, day or two AT MAXIMUM) and psychological (ear and mind adaptation). Even my non-audiophile friend said that when he built his car audio system, it sounded different from what it is now. He didnt even know word burn-in, he just realised that something happened to their sound.

What i do not believe is those "100-500 hours burn-in required before it sounds good" claims. Its simply ridiculous IMHO.



*edit* typo fix. what the heck that 'its' did in the middle of sentence?

 

[Firevortex]

this topic has been done to death. full cans yes there is a difference. IEMs no. even the manufacturers said so them selves. but there are ppl ignorant enough to believe burn ins for every digital device!

 

[Firevortex]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MaZa I believe in both physical (only few hours, day or two AT MAXIMUM) and psychological (ear and mind adaptation). Even my non-audiophile friend said that when he built his car audio system, it sounded different from what it is now. He didnt even know word burn-in, he just realised that something its happen to their sound. What i do not believe is those "100-500 hours burn-in required before it sounds good" claims. Its simply ridiculous IMHO.

i;ve been playing with car audio system for many years now. and break-in burn-ins are real just like any speaker system. yes it takes about 100hrs+ to get a car speaker properly "broken in".

 

[]|[ GorE]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MaZa I believe in both physical (only few hours, day or two AT MAXIMUM) and psychological (ear and mind adaptation). Even my non-audiophile friend said that when he built his car audio system, it sounded different from what it is now. He didnt even know word burn-in, he just realised that something its happen to their sound. What i do not believe is those "100-500 hours burn-in required before it sounds good" claims. Its simply ridiculous IMHO.

Seconded.A day of burn in is more than enough.

 

[erlik]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MaZa I believe in both physical (only few hours, day or two AT MAXIMUM) and psychological (ear and mind adaptation). Even my non-audiophile friend said that when he built his car audio system, it sounded different from what it is now. He didnt even know word burn-in, he just realised that something happened to their sound. What i do not believe is those "100-500 hours burn-in required before it sounds good" claims. Its simply ridiculous IMHO.

Agreed also, real (not IEM) headphones seems to only give their full potential after a few hours of use. Also it seems that I take a few hours to learn to listen properly to new headphones.

For big car speakers the physical burn-in time is maybe longer.

 

[milkpowder]

I have a feeling that my E500 did actually burn-in. I can distinctly hear that the highs have cleared up and the sort of veil lifted a bit. They are slightly more detailed than before and the bass is now slightly more transparent. There's also a slight increase in impact in the bass and much less of the ever so slightly bass smear into the midrange.

I didn't log my hours, but this morning, I woke up and the sound definitely has improved. I've heard that speaker crossover electronics do burn-in. Might this be the case with the E500 being 2-way IEMs with a crossover? I'm actually pretty impressed with this slight hike in performance and now I feel that they can do classical slightly better

People over at the Hong Kong Mingo headphone forums have been logging their E500 performance throughout their listening and burn-in process and they swear that there are at least two stages of burn-in. (For those of you who can read Chinese:http://www.mingo-hmw.com/phpBB2/view...er=asc&start=0)

I'm interested to know from multi-driver IEM users about their thoughts on burn-in. To reiterate, I feel that it isn't the transducers that are burning in, but the crossover electronics. I feel this way because there's more definition and much less smearing between the lower and higher frequencies.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ]|[ GorE Quote: Originally Posted by MaZa What i do not believe is those "100-500 hours burn-in required before it sounds good" claims. Its simply ridiculous IMHO. Seconded.A day of burn in is more than enough.

Let your own ears be the judge.

 

[PiccoloNamek]

I do not believe in burn in. No headphone or speaker or IEM or amplifier I have ever had or used has ever changed in its sonic characteristics.

 

[robm321]

The weekly burn in thread

 

[milkpowder]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Firevortex i;ve been playing with car audio system for many years now. and break-in burn-ins are real just like any speaker system. yes it takes about 100hrs+ to get a car speaker properly "broken in".

It only gets ridiculous when people into super high-end hifi tell you their CDP, preamps and amps take years to become fully burned-in even when left to play 12 hours a day!

 

[krmathis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dacavalcante Do you believe in burn in ?

Yes, I do!

 

[milkpowder]

Quote:

Originally Posted by krmathis Yes, I do!

Do electrostatic headphones burn-in?

 

[F107plus5]

I dunno, but it sure "seems" as though I noticed a change in the way bass was presented after about four weeks, on two different, but related, sets of cans.

.....uh, change for the better. Levels on a plot may be the same as originally shipped, but the character of the sound produced may have been modified be time, in ways currently unmeasurable.

 

[krmathis]

Quote:

Originally Posted by milkpowder Do electrostatic headphones burn-in?

In my opinon, yes they do!
I say that all parts which transport an electric current benefit from burn-in. Regardless if the parts are used in an electrostatic or dynamic headphone.