For Your Edification and Enjoyment re "Burn In", etc.

bluemoodriver, thank you! I seem to occupy a position in the industry and community that is fairly vacant, that of eschewing most forms of system enhancements/methods called "tweaks", and endorsing other methods that some ridicule. It all comes out of building hundreds of systems, not theory.

I will disgruntle those who take a hard objectivist position in terms of components, and disgruntle those who take a hard position on tweaks. So be it. OTOH, I have split the difference once again in not only this article, but also a cable review that has just been submitted. It reveals with very strong evidence, if one explores the materials the company has made public, that 1. Geometry, conductor material, etc. do make an audible difference, and 2. That when well designed according to strict parameters (measurable), it sounds better than other cables. So, that article steps a bit into both camps.

I recall my father, who when discussing particular subjects would opine, "There are a lot of left fielders, and a lot of right fielders, but not a lot of center fielders." I’m trying to play center field. BTW, can we please for once have our reactionist politically motivated disturbers hold their tongue? The comment has zero relevance to politics, and I don't care what your opinion is on the matter. The topic is tweaks. Thank you!  :)

https://resources.altium.com/p/what-burn-testing-electronics

@douglas_schroeder 

Hmmm, I can only comment from admittedly limited experience. I have upgraded from a well run-in Antelope Audio Zodiac Gold to a Zodiac Platinum. For the first 500(!) hours I thought I had made a mistake until literally all of a sudden the fog cleared and I had substantially enhanced micro-detail, soundstage width and depth as well as significantly improved impulse performance.

In a similar vain, I replaced JAN Philips 7581a tubes with NOS cryo‘ed Svetlana Winged-C 6L6GCs in my Wavac EC 300b amp.
The goal was to eliminate a slightly forward, discant emphasising sound. What I got for the first 50 hours was numb, incongruous sound and I was ready to give up. All of a sudden though, holographic soundstage, sweet but intense violin sound and an overall organic presentation that I was looking for.

In summary: while I agree that for basic ‘good-better’ comparisons, burn-in can be largely ignored, for real fine tuning it is essential to account for it.

I agree with antigrunge and my experiences with most components has been that use makes a serious difference in sound. I dont even care why this might be. 

However, I read most of the article and I dont think that anything schroeder said was objectionable.  In fact I am not sure he said much of anything. Kind of milquetoast. I agree with most of what was written, but am not sure why he felt the need.

douglas_schroeder

Thank You for the excellent article!

Happy Listening!