[dweaver]

Zeo I see you found the appropriate thread to proselytize

BTW when I burned in my IE8 I was using my TF10's and checking the IE8 as I went along. So I wasn't burning my head in to the IE8 but rather to my TF10. But I do agree that head burnin also takes place as we use new gear. Photofan gives a clear example of true A/B testing showing a difference between burned in and new IE8. Some have gone so far as to say they notice their IE8 to burn out after 800-1000 hrs of use. Usually this is people who had a well used IE8 die and the new replacement from Sennheiser was noticeably brighter.

The reality is dynamic based IEM's have moving parts thats get stretched and broken is as they are used so many of them show noticeable changes especially out of the box. BA based IEM's on the other hand use a different technology that does not have much if any burnin. BTW I I do agree that 500hrs is a bit on the "this doesn't make sense side" as a person would have to let their IEM's burnin 20 plus days before they even used them.

 

[Alec E]

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Originally Posted by dweaver /img/forum/go_quote.gif Zeo I see you found the appropriate thread to proselytize

Burn-in believers are proselytizing in virtually every thread in which they post. It simply isn't commented upon because they're the majority here.

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BTW when I burned in my IE8 I was using my TF10's and checking the IE8 as I went along. So I wasn't burning my head in to the IE8 but rather to my TF10. But I do agree that head burnin also takes place as we use new gear. Photofan gives a clear example of true A/B testing showing a difference between burned in and new IE8. Some have gone so far as to say they notice their IE8 to burn out after 800-1000 hrs of use. Usually this is people who had a well used IE8 die and the new replacement from Sennheiser was noticeably brighter.

I think that any scientist, or even any college-level science student, would dismiss the whole of this as worthlessly anecdotal. Burn-in advocates seem never even to have heard the term "anecdotal evidence." It's a pejorative, by the way.

Any thoughts on the link further back in this thread--the graph about the Grado?

EDIT: Oops, the graph is in another thread about burn-in, same OP as this one. Not quite halfway down the first page.

http://www.head-fi.org/forums/f4/any...-graph-397109/

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The reality is dynamic based IEM's have moving parts thats get stretched and broken is as they are used so many of them show noticeable changes especially out of the box. BA based IEM's on the other hand use a different technology that does not have much if any burnin.

This is a bit comical. Why then would a BA based IEM ever display burn-in? Why was the Shure SE530 sometimes said to do so? What's the explanation?

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BTW I I do agree that 500hrs is a bit on the "this doesn't make sense side" as a person would have to let their IEM's burnin 20 plus days before they even used them.

Why is 500 hours unreasonable to you? Simply because the number piques your sense of the absurd? You need a better reason than that, amigo.

 

[dweaver]

LOL show me the evidence that disproves burnin and then we wil talk. Until then I simply know what I hear. I guess the best way to put it, is you believe in your religion and I'll belive in mine because neither one of us is going to be able to prove what we believe in anyway.

BTW I do admit that people who believe in burnin sometimes seem to believe in it to an unbelievable level (in my opinion anyway) but that goes back to me point about belief. In the case of those who believe in 500 hour burnins they have a stronger belief than I, just as those who don't believe in burnin are that way to different levels.

So you do have the right to naysay someones comment about burnin when it's brought up in a thread just as the person mentioning it had the right to suggest it to the OP. I guess I just wish people wouldn't feel the need to resort to name calling or belittling the people in the other camp (I mean that both ways BTW).

 

[Alec E]

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Originally Posted by dweaver /img/forum/go_quote.gif LOL show me the evidence that disproves burnin

Ur doin it wrong.

 

[rawrster]

The topic of burn in gets old really fast here..either you believe it or you don't. It's as simple as that

You're not going to change the opinion of another who believes is one or the other very easily. You hear a difference or you dont

However 500 hours does seem over the top for burn in.

 

[dweaver]

rawrster is correct, the burden of proof goes both ways and isn't possible from either camp so it just comes down to you believe it or don't.

Let me ask one question though. If I suggest to someone to try and burn in their headphones at night for a week and see if they notice a difference, have I harmed them in any way? If at the end of the week the person is happy with their headphones whether it's head burn in or headphone burnin does it matter? If on the other hand I make no suggestion or convince them to not try anything under any circumstances and the OP sells their headphones for a loss or simply returns them and never hears them for what they really are, because they assume they were not right for them have I done them a disservice?

 

[KLS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by rawrster /img/forum/go_quote.gif The topic of burn in gets old really fast here..either you believe it or you don't. It's as simple as that You're not going to change the opinion of another who believes is one or the other very easily. You hear a difference or you dont However 500 hours does seem over the top for burn in.

Great @rawrster to make a long story short

 

[Alec E]

Quote:

Originally Posted by rawrster /img/forum/go_quote.gif The topic of burn in gets old really fast here..

Then perhaps you shouldn't contribute to the need for discussions on the matter by telling others that they should burn in an IEM before they comment on it--as you've done in the recent past. How hypocritical.

The greater tendency toward censoriousness in this disagreement is not being shown on the part of burn-in's skeptics, in my experience.

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either you believe it or you don't. It's as simple as that

Profound, but no. Someone is presumably right, and someone is presumably wrong. The party making the assertive claim--your party--has the greater obligation to provide some kind of proof at some point. Instead, burn-in advocates tend to carry on as if they had no concept of what proof would entail ("I just listened to it again and I can definitely tell you..."), and though they themselves preach their gospel with every post in every thread about any new IEM, they brand burn-in skeptics as chesty trolls, and they yawn and roll their eyes at an attempt at clarifying the matter, in a thread such as this. It's a childish evasion of the real question.

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You're not going to change the opinion of another who believes is one or the other very easily.

Why should it be easy? No one's saying it should. The less easy burden is on your team, however.

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You hear a difference or you dont

Or you imagine that you don't. That's rather the point.

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However 500 hours does seem over the top for burn in.

Why? One of you, please answer that question.

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Originally Posted by dweaver /img/forum/go_quote.gif rawrster is correct, the burden of proof goes both ways and isn't possible from either camp so it just comes down to you believe it or don't.

Read that link again. Second, it's perfectly possible. It would cost the price of two IEM's, a few research subjects, and a study supervisor. With all the money floating around on this forum, I don't understand why Head Fi hasn't simply sponsored such an event already. I'd be willing to put my money where my mouth is and contribute at least $100, providing the experiment is supervised by someone with a scientific, academic background.

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Let me ask one question though. If I suggest to someone to try and burn in their headphones at night for a week and see if they notice a difference, have I harmed them in any way?

No, and nor would a physician have harmed his patients by passing out sugar pills. He may well have wasted their time, though. Burn-in advocates find threads questioning their assertions to be such a terrible waste of time that they really ought to be better able to sympathize!

The real issue for me, however, is that references to burn-in are never phrased anything like as you've described--no one ever suggests burn-in in such a grandmotherly way. A person is asked if they've burned-in an IEM in the tone that a child might be asked if he's brushed his teeth. Those who are skeptical of burn-in are virtually excluded from the overall conversation. They are simpletons who haven't even mastered the basics.

And yet the burn-in advocates, who can counsel 300 hours of burn-in with a straight face, find 500 absurd. Why?

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If at the end of the week the person is happy with their headphones whether it's head burn in or headphone burnin does it matter?

I find such nonchalance, about the strong possibility of self-delusion, rather alarming in an adult. You're also practically confessing here that you don't know what you're talking about.

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If on the other hand I make no suggestion or convince them to not try anything under any circumstances and the OP sells their headphones for a loss or simply returns them and never hears them for what they really are, because they assume they were not right for them have I done them a disservice?

And if you tell the person that Santa won't bring them any presents if they're hasty with their IEM... This is simply not how adults deal with one another. Counseling patience doesn't necessarily equate to proselytizing for burn-in.

I don't disbelieve in burn-in--but the advocates of burn-in make such a hash of things, when arguing their case, that I've certainly become a skeptic.

 

[Photofan1986]

So many sceptic people here it has become a complete septic tank !

 

[chrisssssssss2]

No, my IE8s sound exactly the same as they did when I first got them. And yes I feel the sound changed, because I tried to like them at first and found the highs really sparkly, but then I realized I was only kidding myself. So I guess the burn-in effect had a bad one in my case.

And do you notice how whenever someone talks about burn-in, the burn-in usually produces a good effect? Why do people never say "oh it's been 100 hours and the bass has become out of control." It's kind've amusing sometimes reading about burn-in.

 

[dweaver]

LOL last post from me on the subject.

Alec E this seems very important to you. I suggest you gather some other people who don't believe in headphone burnin and put together this study you feel would prove it doesn't exist.

I reread your link above and while this sounds all fine and dandy from the philosophers view, I will use it's own argument against it. It asserts the belief that burden of proof lies with the person making the claim (itself) so now all of the philosophers of the world need to take the burden of proof to show that the the burden of proof is true.

While your doing all that, me I'll burn in my new dynamic headphones if I am not sure they sound quite right and enjoy my music

.

Have fun on your crusade.

 

[rawrster]

How is it hypocritical? So what if I have recommended burn in? The topic of burn is does get old very fast. There have been many threads on this subject, this very same debate on whether it exists or not and none of them have been resolved and this one will not be either.

Either way it doesn't really matter if people believe it or not. I know what I hear and that is all I need.

 

[Zeo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dweaver /img/forum/go_quote.gif Zeo I see you found the appropriate thread to proselytize .

It was not my point. My point was : how to promote an IEM by saying :

- It is going to take 50 hours to get the sound quality of a PFE (3 time less expensive IEM)
- Then 500 to 800 hrs to get the max quality
- Some experienced a burn out after 1000 hrs

It is a complete nonsense. The synthese of the post would be : you will pay 350$ for IEM you aren ot going to use for the next 30 days (1000 hrs 24/7) because they need a burn in (pink noise I suppose, high level, in complete line with the purpose of an IEM), but then you have 8 days of full usability (200 hrs=1000-800) before they may burn out.

The IE8 does not deserve such a meaning less description.

I think that reasonnable arguments would be : with a dynamic armature, there is a membrane, and like all audio component using a membrane, some thinks a burn in is usefull some thinks the opposite, but there is a consensus that a membrane takes between 30 to 50hrs to burn in. That a reasonnable average. However, it is proven that ears may take much more time to adapt to different presentation of the sound, increasing the burn in time appreciation.

 

[Photofan1986]

^ That's a very wise post, I must say.

 

[klekk]

I am no audiophile and not very good at describing how something sounds. I just know when something sounds good. I have a pair of IE8 purchased in august last year. after 4 months the sound on the left ear started to get quieter than the right. So i called sennheiser and had them replaced. The new IE8 sounded very different than my old. So there is an effect of burn in. Now that i have around 500 + hours on my new ie8 they sound amazin again.