EMI Circuit/Component Saturation

I've just been made aware that if components are left powered on for prolonged periods i.e. days-months they can become "saturated" - which in turn degrades performance.

The saturation may even extend to IC's and SC'c (so I'm told).

Personally I leave my system on 24/7 - NAIM actually recommends leaving their gear on and since I have a NAIM amp I adopted their "norm" for everything

Anyhow - I tried a few things to see what the impact might be.
1. Turned off my DAC + V-Link for an evening - left the amp powered on
- next day the system sounded significantly more lively and brighter with an extension to the high frequencies

2. Then I turned both Amp and DAC/V-link off for the evening
- next day the sound was as good as in #1 above, but I would not say that there were any further improvements to the sound.

I'm currently allowing my phono stage to Saturate before I can test that.

Since EMI saturation is more of an issue with very high frequencies, such as those used in digital sources I figure this explains why the digital side of my rig appeared to be affected more than the analogue-only amp.

I also think it has a lot to do with component quality and design e.g.

- I would assume the NAIM amp was affected less due to the fact it's design to be left powered on and as such is probably designed to better handle EMI saturation issues.

- whereas my DAC, which is more budget oriented, is probably not really designed to cope with EMI saturation issues

FYI: with my Bifrost DAC + V-link I noticed the highs starting to tail-off after being powered on for 4 days and after 6 days there appeared to be no further degradation.

So if you leave your components powered on for extended periods try this simple test and see if it makes any difference.

Costs nothing to try :-)