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I hope break in is true

This is the first time I ever bought a brand new out of the box Preamp. No, wait. Second but, the other doesn't count.
I had made previous posts about my decision to downsize.
I have, everything is kinda good. You know, Okay.
I bought a pre here. great seller, great store. Couldn't have been smoother.
I am just not used to this type of stuff. I wanted something with a phono included. I kept it well under a $1000.00
Now, I got to ask you guys. Will this thing get better???/
I have not had to worry about break in before. Does it really exist?
It is a very well built unit. Remote, I'm not used to that! That's nice. Has everything I need. Except it isn't alive. The music is there, presented very nicely. Clean, no extra stuff. Just doesn't have any dimension.
Please tell me this is going to get better:)
scottht
cerrot's avatar
cerrot
1,700 posts
 
My Esoteric X03-SE took 1200 hours to break in. No myth. No Joke. Others who have it said the same-my dealer has one also and, again, took him over 1000 hours. I'd say some items sound very god out of the box and get better after 100 hours or so (+); The Esoteric sounded absolutely horrible out of the box and is now one of the best CD players I have heard - no joke, guys.
cerrot's avatar
cerrot
1,700 posts
 
Throwing another of my two cents - don't confuse break in and warming up. My gear still takes 40 or so minutes before sounding it's best. The squeezebox/benchmark only takes about 20 minutes or so but the Esoteric likes to play a bit longer before blowing my mind. My Meridian 588 took 2 hours before sounding it's best (which I never thought was very good, by the way--but much better than when it first started playing).
thepreludeimplicit
27 posts
 
Every new component I have purchased has had a noticeable increase in SQ. It has ranged from subtle to Wow. A recent pre-amp purchase was a Wow. Its phono stage has gone from meh to glorius. After break in I believe the caps, resistors, ect finally reach their proper/rated operating spec, therefore I think this is designed in from the beginning.

As the previous post mentioned, my system like a side or two before its all warm and fuzzy. 

aberyclark
1,355 posts
 
I've never purchased a new piece of equipment where I did not like at first, then after a few weeks, I started liking. Sounds like talking yourself into the component and settling. Now, I believe break in is very real. However, the MAJOR sonic character should be there out of the box. I'm not saying you cannot improve it with speaker placement, etc. 

again. That's just me. 
213runnin
914 posts
 
Theprelude, the previous post to which you refer is 9 years old.  Surely something more recent has been said on the topic!
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