[JahJahBinks]

Do the type and loudness of sound used for break-in matter much or are they highly subjective?

 

[pedxing]

This question is asked many times and the answers come out more or less the same, but the finer details always remained muddled.

Loudness makes a difference. Turning the volume all the way down will not help break your headphones in. However, you do not want to turn the volume to super loud and blow out your headphones.

Moderate listening volume is good for breaking headphones in. Also, if the music has a wide range of frequencies, especially some bass, that will help loosen the headphone drivers a bit. I find classical music or orchestra music works best, especially if a lot of deep percussions are used.

In general, I just believe that people should just listen to their headphones and not worry about burning them in unless the manufacturer has recommendations or instructions about the burning process.

 

[JaZZ]

Quote:

«...you do not want to turn the volume to super loud and blow out your headphones.»

You have to explicitly follow the second part of this advice... otherwise the burn-in process can't properly complete!

Whereas the first part does really help burning-in a lot, the more so with tons of bass.

 

[Old Pa]

Yes, JahJahBinks, they do. Headphones differ as to how they benefit from break in (the process of playing sound through the 'phones while not on your head to loosen and settle the drivers and related components). CAUTION: some headphone manufacturers specify that certain models of their headphones (such as STAX) should NOT be played with no head in the way as the drivers may damage each other. All that said, break in can be through the process of just using the phones (generally takes longer) or accelerated by playing a break in track repeatedly through the phones for a couple of days. Accelerated break in is without your head and ears in the way and is at a volume higher than for general listening but not so great as to damage the phone drivers. Audio break in tracks have sounds of wide frequency differences with plenty at low and high end to loosen the drivers at those extremes. Audio breakin in tracks may be found on test and demonstration CDs such at Stereophile's #3 test CD or XLO Reference Recording's Test/Burnin CD (also HDCD). So the 3 rules to burn in are don't do any damage, wide frequency range to the burn in sound, and slightly louder than loud listening levels. Good luck.

 

[pedxing]

The reason why I said to just listen to your headphones as you would normally is because you would probably will not run into the risk of busting your headphones.

Accelerated burn in had given some people some bad misconeptions because some people believe that more extreme the volume and more extreme the frequencies, the quicker it will burn. Although it may work, you might risk damaging your headphones. If you want to really do accelerated burn-ins, I would look for a professional sound source such as the CD's Old Pa has mentioned.

Unless you are an audio equipment expert, I do not recommend in trying to build your own sound tracks with a wave generator or a computer to burn in the headphones with. Some people have tried it with funny wave forms (square waves) or with extreme frequencies (like 25+ kHz), both with with extreme volumes, and ended up with a product that rattles a lot.

 

[ServinginEcuador]

I agree with Pedxing, but would like to modify it to a small extent: try placing the cans on your head and adjust the volume to your normal listening level, then turn it up a little more, not much, then set them down and come back for a listen in the morning. I do this using a pink noise cd I got from eBay for $10. It's a 70 minute cd of pink noise to run full spectrum sound thru the equipment. I wanted to use this for breaking in cans and my equipment, but it is not necessary. After that I bought Bass Mekanik's Quad Maximus cd which has bass notes from 10-100Hz in five secong increments each. These are tracks 18 and above I think, so if you start with the regular music on tracks 1-16 or so at a normal listening level and DON'T turn them up a bunch for the test tracks you'll get a complete and thorough break-in in 48 hours. 24 of pink noise, 24 of really bass intensive stuff.

Just my .02 and point of view, not a guideline that all must follow!!!