[sampson_smith]

You obviously have a lot of time on your hands, man. Sorry about getting under your skin, but the whole purpose of this thread was to generate discourse that was helpful. If I may correct your English, I think it's "we're just going to keep going in circles chasing each others' tails". Except, I'm not up to that task. You and I both know that for the moment burn-in sits on the subjective side of the fence. It is not unreasonable, though, to ask for and welcome both subjective and objective discourse on the subject. Please re-read my initial post that clearly states that I accept the subjective nature of burn-in, in case you are not aware what this is really about. Next positive, constructive comment, thanks!

 

[jacdan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by sampson_smith /img/forum/go_quote.gif Cheers to Head-fi!

I wish my wallet could say the same

 

[sampson_smith]

At first I was just mildly annoyed with your remarks. And then I re-read your forum name. Shouldn't you just stick to the official "Koyaanisqatsi: Life Out Of Balance"? Sounds to me that your priorities are off-kilter.

 

[kwkarth]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Koyaan I. Sqatsi /img/forum/go_quote.gif Not as much time on my hands as those who have the time to re-hash decades old arguments. You said you wanted to get to the bottom of this. I'm simply pointing out that you can't hope to get to the bottom of this unless you bring something more to the table beside subjective experience. Yes. Along with frozen photographs, "Intelligent Chips" and teleportation tweaks. And there it will stay until as I said you bring something more to the table. I just noticed the sticky regarding the prohibiting of the discussion of blind testing in this forum. So it would seem that objective discourse is rather limited. I'm not sure what you mean about accepting the subjective nature of burn-in. Is that to say that you acknowledge that the perception of burn-in is subjective and that such perception may not have anything to do with burn-in, but rather it's possible it may be a purely psychological phenomenon? k

I think most folks here recognize the point that sampson_smith made regarding the seeming overwhelming acceptance of some form of run in prior to evaluation of a new set of cans (large quantity of repeated behaviors observed) as being a possible at least semi-"objective" data point to consider.

When such large numbers of people repeat this behavior, the behavior moves from the realm of individual subjectivity, into what? Group/mass hypnosis? Social movement? Revolution? Mob mentality? What?

If no one observes any difference, why "do" it? I agree that one could easily explain away some, if not all of this "observed" phenomena to mere accommodation. If that's the case, lots of people are fooled, even though, as sampson_smith noted, many of us are schooled in these pitfalls, and work assiduously to avoid falling prey to our proclivities.

I also agree with you that we should qualify these break in changes we hear with instrumented measurements. Wish we had access to the instrumentation needed to do this.

 

[rds]

Maybe a sponsor could help to qualify this a bit. Headroom comes to mind.
They could pull a popular reference headphone (hd650?) new from the box measure it, burn it in for 100 hours with pink noise and measure again.
...come to think of it the k701 might be a better choice since there is so much talk of major changes after burn in. If we didn't find any significant changes in that headphone it would be a pretty strong argument against burn in.
*note to Headroom: being the first to finally qualify this long standing debate should be good for business right?

 

[sampson_smith]

I think that's a fine idea. I previously mentioned that they could do a set of finely-measured response curves comparing a new and very well-used "set" of headphones. It obviously would be a better test if that "set" is actually the same headphone, simply at early and late stages in its development. Off hand, I would imagine that the AKG K701/K702 would be an ideal candidate. It seems to be the most commonplace headphone that also benefits most from burn-in. It's over a very long period, mind you, but there are many who believe it goes from "unlistenable" to "unparalleled" after thorough break-in.

 

[aimlink]

Quote:

Originally Posted by kwkarth /img/forum/go_quote.gif If no one observes any difference, why "do" it? I agree that one could easily explain away some, if not all of this "observed" phenomena to mere accommodation. If that's the case, lots of people are fooled, even though, as sampson_smith noted, many of us are schooled in these pitfalls, and work assiduously to avoid falling prey to our proclivities.

Based on the solid assumption that we're not as special relative to each other as we may think we are, I can give my own testimony.

As a recent head-fier among these groups, I've been reading about this break-in thing and see that just about all reviews followed by commendations from fellow readers, will always give initial impressions followed by those after burn-in periods. That solid pattern of reporting by apparently experienced headphone users is a POWERFUL and self-propagating experience. So no, I personally wouldn't by any means rule out a mass influence. My SR325is' are the first set of cans that I haven't attempted giving a deliberate burn-in period since it has sounded great from the start. I've been trying it with all the cans I've acquired. Surely there must be something, I say, but I can't say that I've heard any significant changes with burn-in.

Further evidence of mass influence is how some cans or amp's/dac's are extremely popular for no particular reason while others are mysteriously unpopular.

 

[aimlink]

Quote:

Originally Posted by sampson_smith /img/forum/go_quote.gif I think that's a fine idea. I previously mentioned that they could do a set of finely-measured response curves comparing a new and very well-used "set" of headphones. It obviously would be a better test if that "set" is actually the same headphone, simply at early and late stages in its development. Off hand, I would imagine that the AKG K701/K702 would be an ideal candidate. It seems to be the most commonplace headphone that also benefits most from burn-in. It's over a very long period, mind you, but there are many who believe it goes from "unlistenable" to "unparalleled" after thorough break-in.

Playing Devil's Advocate,

My only problem with this is that if you do a lab analysis of a 320Kbps/sec mp3, you'll see a lot of difference between it and its WAV counterpart. However, what does this translate to for human experience? There may be a few who find the difference to be like night and day, but what about an average set of head-fi ears?

I'd really love to see the result of a blind test comparing 256-320Kbits/sec mp3's with wav's for a range of contemporary recording samples. I also find it curious that when a small test of this type is done, the listener breaks a sweat while making the effort to successfully tell in 70% of cases. What's left to be decided is that though it does seem detectable, just how important is it for enjoying the music.

The same would therefore need to be done for headphone burn-in testing. Blind testing with subjects using both burn-in periods for the headphones would be required in that even if there's a measurable difference, this would need to be demonstrably and reliably discernible by test subjects.

 

[roy_jones]

Quote:

Originally Posted by rds /img/forum/go_quote.gif Maybe a sponsor could help to qualify this a bit. Headroom comes to mind. They could pull a popular reference headphone (hd650?) new from the box measure it, burn it in for 100 hours with pink noise and measure again. ...come to think of it the k701 might be a better choice since there is so much talk of major changes after burn in. If we didn't find any significant changes in that headphone it would be a pretty strong argument against burn in. *note to Headroom: being the first to finally qualify this long standing debate should be good for business right?

It's amazing how little substance there is to these conversations, and yet so much could be resolved by a simple empirical experiment like the one you've suggested.

 

[estreeter]

Whatever the 'science' said, you would still have Head-Fiers who refused to accept any 'findings'. The prevailing attitude in audio seems to be 'if I cant hear it, its not real' (conversely, if they CAN hear it, its very real !). From that point forward, its like opposing armies standing on oppositve hillsides, prepared to charge into battle at the first sign of resistance from their enemies.

This is how cable manufacturers are able to charge exorbitant amounts for speaker cable and interconnects, way past the point of diminishing returns - if I buy their cable, I will fully expect a major difference in the sound because someone at Sterophile told me I would and, hey, I've just invested several hundred dollars in 2 1/2 metre lengths of cable.

This silliness reached its zenith for me yesterday, when I read a glowing review of a speaker stand in 'What Hi-Fi', said stand promising to deliver everything from improved bass response to a more holographic image from my modest bookshelves. I agree that speaker placement is important, but this was just way too many words to sell a pair of speaker stands.

I go back to my earlier point- if you believe in burn-in, then by all means follow whatever rituals make you happy, but I will continue to view any claims re thousand-hour burn-in times with suspicion. If the Ultrasones hadnt sounded good after 5 hours, I would have returned them : simple as that.

 

[aimlink]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Koyaan I. Sqatsi /img/forum/go_quote.gif However, if you can uncover any changes that are within known thresholds of audibility, you'll pretty much have done that.

My own point exactly, i.e., it would not be enough to simply uncover a change, but one would also need to uncover a change that is within known thresholds of audibility, especially since the benefits of burn-in are being enjoyed by so many and not only a few with gifted acoustic acuity.

 

[Uncle Erik]

Quote:

Originally Posted by kwkarth /img/forum/go_quote.gif When such large numbers of people repeat this behavior, the behavior moves from the realm of individual subjectivity, into what? Group/mass hypnosis? Social movement? Revolution? Mob mentality? What?

The same reason people break a bottle of champagne over the bow of a new ship, most office buildings "don't have" a 13th floor and why new members are told "sorry about your wallet."

Will a ship have bad luck without the christening? Does anything bad really happen on the "14th" floor of a building?

Humans love ritual, tradition and ceremony. If a groom sees a bride before the wedding, does it really hurt the relationship?

Burn-in is the same. If people love the tradition and ritual there's nothing wrong with that. I have my little vinyl ritual and I love traditions and ceremonies.

I just don't ascribe scientific meaning to rituals, ceremonies and traditions. They should be enjoyed and celebrated, but superstition is not science.

 

[aimlink]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Uncle Erik /img/forum/go_quote.gif The same reason people break a bottle of champagne over the bow of a new ship, most office buildings "don't have" a 13th floor and why new members are told "sorry about your wallet." Will a ship have bad luck without the christening? Does anything bad really happen on the "14th" floor of a building? Humans love ritual, tradition and ceremony. If a groom sees a bride before the wedding, does it really hurt the relationship? Burn-in is the same. If people love the tradition and ritual there's nothing wrong with that. I have my little vinyl ritual and I love traditions and ceremonies. I just don't ascribe scientific meaning to rituals, ceremonies and traditions. They should be enjoyed and celebrated, but superstition is not science.

I like that.

Nice comments.

 

[LnxPrgr3]

Quote:

Originally Posted by sampson_smith /img/forum/go_quote.gif I can't remember if this has been clearly stated yet, but it is very perplexing to me that there is so much inherent debate about burn-in theory while, at the same time, its effect is inextricable from any comments about how relatively new headphones sound. When we discuss/review a new pair of 'phones and their sound signature, 95% of the time we qualify our impression based on whether there has been adequate burn-in time.

Out of respect for the retailer I've done the most headphone-related business with, I make sure to give new headphones burn-in time before returning them. Of course, my position on burnin is "undecided," so while I'm not convinced it happens to the levels a lot of people report, I'm not 100% it doesn't happen either.

As far as burn-in experiences, my strongest experience with this was also my first experience with any quality headphone, and so I don't really trust what I heard all that much :-D Could have been my ears adjusting to a sound signature that didn't include a strong 100Hz resonance.

 

[kwkarth]

Uncle Eric, I like your conclusion!

I was going to comment, that real or not, I find a subjective improvement with some headphones with run in time.

With other models of cans, I hear little or no difference. When I worked for a headphone manufacturer as their headphone product manager, my roles consisted of engineering, design, marketing, production scheduling, managing aspects of manufacturing, supply chain, and sales management. I did not have sole responsibility for any of those individual things, but I was where the buck stopped if any balls got dropped. When I showed up, there were many balls dropping to the floor regularly, and I had to get intimately involved in every step of the process in order to solve the problems and improve the products, to make them world class in their own right.

Having the opportunity to listen to hundreds of copies of identical headphones was an eye opener. Many things I suspected, were either validated, or proved wrong, once and for all.

I can tell you from real world experience that burn in is real. I proved it to myself over and over, but wearing so many hats, never had time to sit down to see if it could be objectively measured. I'm still not sure that it can. There are many things we still have not learned to measure, that can be heard.

Bottom line of all of what I've shared is that it's still a subjective observation for me, and you can take it or leave it. I choose to recognize it, work with it, and obtain enjoyment from this hobby as a result.

Cheers!