[AndrewF]

This is a seriously newb question and I apologize if it has been answered previously- I tried searching and didn't find it.

I've never had a headphone amp before and don't really know what the best way to burn it in is. My thought was just to hook it up to my Nano, with or without the lineout cable (it hasn't arrived yet), and just let it play my entire library through an older pair of headphones, at moderate to slightly high listening volume. Basically just let it run for a few days this way.

Any problems with this? Will I overheat the amp? Does it need to power off occasionally? Should I burn it in with my UM2's attached (I was hoping to save these to use with my shuffle for working out).

Andrew

 

[Morph201]

You got it! As a matter of fact, you don't need to have the volume turned up, just attach a pair of cans or iems to it, in addition to the ipod source, and let that sucker cook!

I just noticed you have a TH, no it won't overheat.. let the first pair of batteries drain out.. (~ 400 hours? low gain).

 

[Nebby]

I've found the easiest way to burn-in, is to plug the power adapter to my ipod, set it to repeat thru a somewhat varied tracklist (though I doubt it matters all too much for an amp), hook up the amp to the headphone out, and leave the whole bundle playing in a corner for a week or so. Depending on the amp you may have to swap out batteries but with a TH you should be set. When you boil it down, burn-in for an amp really just consists of putting current thru the electronics in it, whereas burn-in for a headphone is a bit different.

 

[AndrewF]

Thanks- very helpful.

af

 

[mrarroyo]

The volume can and IMO should be in low. No need to have music blasting.

 

[tnmike1]

so if I do this, I'm not going to hurt the Ipod's harddrive? 5g Ipod by the way. Afraid of damaging the thing because I don't know how fragile it is

 

[laxx]

I move my cd player to the side of my room, on top of my drawer. Then I plug in a pair of headphones (I don't use my pk1, sr60, hd595 all too often), so I double up and burn in the amp and headphones together.

Just a few weeks ago when I got my Darkvoice 332, I burned in my SR60's for an additional 50 hours and my pk1's for 50 hours for a total of 100 hours on the Darkvoice. =T When I get new tubes, more burnin for pk1's and w/e else I have. =T Might as well do two things at once.

 

[ecclesand]

I used my older Ipod Mini to burn in my K701 for 300+ hours. I was a bit concerned about ruining my Ipod as it's my only portable source, but then thought...what the hell...if it breaks I can upgrade.

Seriously though, no problems at all with the Mini after 300 hours...

 

[Nebby]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tnmike1 /img/forum/go_quote.gif so if I do this, I'm not going to hurt the Ipod's harddrive? 5g Ipod by the way. Afraid of damaging the thing because I don't know how fragile it is

the hard drive in the ipod is literally a laptop hard drive customized for apple, and there is virtually no wear and tear from having it just playing. The only serious issues that you have to worry about with hard drive ipods/hard drives in general are impacts, ie. dropping them. Simply playing them for any length of time will cause no harm to your precious Ipod

 

[platinum]

i suggest playing music though flash-type MP3 players. who cares cheapy mp3 players failed

 

[Nebby]

Haha...that would work too! But truthfully with the ipod's caching, the hard drive isn't going to be accessed all that much. It's also the secret to the ipod's long battery life; the ipod reads a song or two, caches them to memory, then plays from memory.

 

[Filburt]

More than anything, I'd suggest reading up on the basis for claims about burn-in and critically evaluate the evidence. I think that would both help you decide whether it's something worth dedicating time to, and also perhaps inform you about what to do should you decide the claims are accurate. I've never had to, nor have I met anyone in the industries I've worked in who've had to, burn in components like this before achieving specified and stable performance. Maybe you'll find otherwise; I don't know. Placebotic effects can be rather powerful, though, and coupled with cognitive bias I think can produce a systemic bias (tendency of a process to favour a particular outcome) towards verifying burn in claims when doing sighted listening tests; so perhaps that's something to watch out for in evaluation.

 

[cotdt]

There is no need to burn in amps! Maybe it would help tubes, but SS amps won't benefit from burn in. I have really great hearing and never noticed a difference.

 

[c0mfortably_numb]

I prefer to play pink noise well burning in equipment, you can obtain a 20 minute track here just put it on replay and let it burn

 

[Gaso]

I myself am not a big fan of pink noise, for me it seems the item I'm burning in sounds a bit duller after each session, and I'm lost at why. Real music instead seems to give at least somewhat positive results (to me).