[jagwap]

I don't think anybody is talking about mass market anything here.

Why not?

Sennhieser is mass market. AKG, JBL, Sony, all mass market. I said some hi end manufacturers do a little burn in, but they are a tiny part of the market.

 

[elmoe]

I'm curious why you believe that.
There is no reason, I can think of, that a modern design with modern materials should get looser, or change in any significant way over the life of the product.

That depends on what's considered significant and whether or not that's audible. Has there been proper blind testing done with headphones known to "need" hundreds of hours of break-in where people could reliably identify the new pair from the old?

 

[geek707]

Why not?

Sennhieser is mass market. AKG, JBL, Sony, all mass market. I said some hi end manufacturers do a little burn in, but they are a tiny part of the market.

Or they have determined that burn in is not necessary and doesn't change how the product sounds. That's a bit different from saying it needs to break in, let the consumer do it for free.

 

[geek707]

That depends on what's considered significant and whether or not that's audible. Has there been proper blind testing done with headphones known to "need" hundreds of hours of break-in where people could reliably identify the new pair from the old?

I'm curious to know what headphones are known to need hundreds of hours of burn-in.

 

[elmoe]

I'm curious to know what headphones are known to need hundreds of hours of burn-in.

Apparently enough of them to warrant a 49 page thread in the Sound Science forum.

 

[geek707]

Apparently enough of them to warrant a 49 page thread in the Sound Science forum.

Why get better? A violin, for example does not get better as it's used. The opposite in fact. (Traditional instrument, not electronic)

 

[elmoe]

Why get better? A violin, for example does not get better as it's used. The opposite in fact. (Traditional instrument, not electronic)

Says who? There are century old Stradivarius violins that are extremely coveted for their sound. Instruments like guitars made in the 50s 60s and 70s. Age is definitely a factor there.

 

[Watagump]

I feel brain burn in is real, not so much electronic burn in.

 

[geek707]

Says who? There are century old Stradivarius violins that are extremely coveted for their sound. Instruments like guitars made in the 50s 60s and 70s. Age is definitely a factor there.

The best Strads are long retired, and what is in use now is nowhere close to the best. Now even a 2ed or 3rd rate Strad (or lower) is very good, and there are reasons other than sound for a performer to own one (status, owning one of about 500 remaining instruments). As for acoustic guitars played professionally, I would bet the same is true.

 

[castleofargh]

Hope you are getting your ferrofluid changed every 3000 miles

anytime I drop a pair of BA IEMs on the ground, I'm super worried that some of the ferrofluid might have gone where it's not supposed to. and it's funny because for any other headphone/IEM, if I drop it on the ground I'm devastated, but for some messed up reason in my brain, I worry about ferrofluid more ^_^.

Apparently enough of them to warrant a 49 page thread in the Sound Science forum.

there are thousands of pages about headphone burn in. but if you read them, you'll notice that controlled tests and measurements can fit in one, maybe 2 pages. the rest is a battle of ego where someone wants to be right and will argue that for a long time while making very sure not to demonstrate anything.

Says who? There are century old Stradivarius violins that are extremely coveted for their sound. Instruments like guitars made in the 50s 60s and 70s. Age is definitely a factor there.

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/05/million-dollar-strads-fall-modern-violins-blind-sound-check

I feel brain burn in is real, not so much electronic burn in.

brain burn in as you call it has been demonstrated so many times that it makes no doubt anymore. the difficulty is to get audiophiles to admit that they're not a perfect reference of objective change. and despite how obvious that should be to anybody who ever had to deal with humans or happens to be one, getting audiophiles to admit that they're not perfect recording devices has been a work in progress for decades. and there is no sign of audiophile communities acknowledging that. we all believe that others can and will be wrong, but being wrong, biased, with non perfect memory ourselves? get out of here!

 

[Watagump]

The body adjusts to all kinds of things, smells, hearing, vision, etc.

 

[Sgt. Ear Ache]

here's a little write-up that makes some cogent points...
https://www.soundonsound.com/sound-advice/do-new-monitor-speakers-really-need-be-run-in#para3

it appears the Kippel stuff is hidden behind a paywall. But it's also about loudspeakers. I'm ever-so-slightly more open to the possibility of some sort of audible burn-in effect in loudspeakers (though still doubtful in the extreme)...but this is head-fi and we're focused on much much smaller/different types of components. The article I linked there makes a point that I consider important as well. We've got people who claim to hear distinct differences in SQ as a result of having burned a set of headphones (or even earbuds) in for a period of time sometimes as much as 100 hours. Any actual measurements I've seen over the years have shown that any changes due to burn in are infinitesimally tiny and very questionably audible. I know from listening to headphones and buds for a number of years that by simply altering the position of the device in or on my ears a tiny amount, the sound can change significantly. As well, a number of other situational conditions can effect sound quality pretty significantly from one session to the next. So we are supposed to accept that a given listener has ears capable of noting nearly imperceptible changes in sound quality between a set of buds he listened to for a short period of time a week ago compared to the same buds today after a hundred hours of burn in - and that those changes have everything to do with burn in and nothing to do with any number of other factors that we KNOW can ACTUALLY fairly dramatically impact SQ from one listening session to the next.

I would be curious to see measurements taken after 20 hrs of burn in and then after 100 hours. I'd bet there is no change at all...

 

[jagwap]

here's a little write-up that makes some cogent points...
https://www.soundonsound.com/sound-advice/do-new-monitor-speakers-really-need-be-run-in#para3

it appears the Kippel stuff is hidden behind a paywall. But it's also about loudspeakers. I'm ever-so-slightly more open to the possibility of some sort of audible burn-in effect in loudspeakers (though still doubtful in the extreme)...but this is head-fi and we're focused on much much smaller/different types of components. The article I linked there makes a point that I consider important as well. We've got people who claim to hear distinct differences in SQ as a result of having burned a set of headphones (or even earbuds) in for a period of time sometimes as much as 100 hours. Any actual measurements I've seen over the years have shown that any changes due to burn in are infinitesimally tiny and very questionably audible. I know from listening to headphones and buds for a number of years that by simply altering the position of the device in or on my ears a tiny amount, the sound can change significantly. As well, a number of other situational conditions can effect sound quality pretty significantly from one session to the next. So we are supposed to accept that a given listener has ears capable of noting nearly imperceptible changes in sound quality between a set of buds he listened to for a short period of time a week ago compared to the same buds today after a hundred hours of burn in - and that those changes have everything to do with burn in and nothing to do with any number of other factors that we KNOW can ACTUALLY fairly dramatically impact SQ from one listening session to the next.

I would be curious to see measurements taken after 20 hrs of burn in and then after 100 hours. I'd bet there is no change at all...

http://www.klippel.de/fileadmin/kli...tigue_and_Aging_of_suspension_AES_NY_2011.pdf

https://www.klippel.de/fileadmin/kl...ts/KLIPPEL Speaker Component Measurements.pdf

https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00810563/document

First page of results of google.

There are pages of this debate elsewhere in Head-fi, all speculative on both sides. But the industry accepts loudspeaker burn-in, break-in etc. I am looking to find something more definative in the headphone industry. When I do, I will add it in Head-Fi. But it probably won't make a difference to the majority of the internet experts here, who have made up their mind.

 

[Sgt. Ear Ache]

http://www.klippel.de/fileadmin/kli...tigue_and_Aging_of_suspension_AES_NY_2011.pdf

https://www.klippel.de/fileadmin/klippel/Bilder/Test_Objects/KLIPPEL Speaker Component Measurements.pdf

https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00810563/document

First page of results of google.

There are pages of this debate elsewhere in Head-fi, all speculative on both sides. But the industry accepts loudspeaker burn-in, break-in etc. I am looking to find something more definative in the headphone industry. When I do, I will add it in Head-Fi. But it probably won't make a difference to the majority of the internet experts here, who have made up their mind.

Thanks. I haven't the time to fully read and absorb those documents, but a quick perusal seems to reveal no real mention of sound quality effects. I mean I don't think anyone is debating that moving components break down over time. What's being debated is that those breakdowns have a notable positive effect on sound quality...

 

[elmoe]

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/05/million-dollar-strads-fall-modern-violins-blind-sound-check

So this article proves that the violinists could tell a new vs old violin apart 100% of the time. They tended to prefer the new, but were all clearly able to tell the difference. In short, age has an effect on sound signature.

I would add that newer instruments tend to be louder compared to old ones, so unless they recorded and volume matched, then the "newer" preferences is easily explainable.