CD Player break in period

I guess there may be something to the 'active load' philosophy. There is no way to know unless identical units have been burned in for the same amount of hours, one by itself, one connected to a 'live' preamp.
Dodgealum, burning up 800-1000 tube hours is exactly why I would not do this. If you feel it necessary to have a preamp turned on, I would suggest grabbing a receiver (I know I have a couple laying around the house), plug the Esoteric into the receiver and turn both on. No need to hook a speaker load to the receiver. I would assume this would accomplish the 'live load' for the player, but not wear out your tubes.

As Germanboxers suggests, and I tend to agree, the 'live load' is a theory with no certain results. Good tubes are too expensive for me to try this with my Ref 3. If I had a SS preamp, I would try this as a "why not?" tweak.

However, I do recommend you investigate the Ayre/Cardas burn in cd. I and many others have found this to be a valuable tool. I would think a few hundred hours with the Ayre/Cardas cd on repeat with no preamp would accomplish more than a few hundred hours with a regular cd with a preamp. Just my $0.02

Cheers,
John

I played mine through the whole system with music for the 1st 24 hours and than went to the Purist Audio II break in cd for the 6 hour session and than played music again for another 200 hours. I would than alternate between the Ayers CD and the Purist Audio for approx 50 hours on and 50 hours off (music). The first 250 or so hours were at moderate volume (solid state, electrostatics and dedicated room, so no problem-besides, I felt the system could go for a good burn/run in as I did perform some upgrades within the prior 6 months). The balance of my break in is at very low volume, unless I am playing another source, at which time it is still running.

I've now heard back from two people who I contacted regarding this question. My dealer instructed me to turn the preamp "on" while breaking in the Esoteric, and so I have for the last 30 hours. Tonight I heard from Esoteric Tech Support. According to these folks no other equipment needs to be connected to the player during break in. Since this is the easier answer for me to accept, I've turned off my pre and will break in the rest of the way solo. I'm not sure what accounts for the discrepancy here--probably nobody really knows for sure whether having the player connected to a live preamp makes a difference. I'm inclined to think that the bulk of the internal components get broken in without a live preamp but perhaps there are some parts related to the output stage that would benefit from a live playmate. Despite this, I'm going to leave the preamp "off" and hope for the best--I'm really not keen on burning up tube life to get the last little bit of break in that might come with a live preamp.

I thought I'd get back to everyone with an update on the break in of my X-03SE. While waiting for my speakers to arrive and break in I managed to put about one hundred hours on the unit in a "passive" break in mode--i.e. with the player spinning a disc solo on repeat mode. Once my speakers arrived I listened mostly to LP's so I could break them in while the cd player spun away. At the 100 hour mark I began using the Esoteric. I listened to several discs and then put the machine on repeat mode so it could break in some more. I would listen again at the next 50 hour interval to the same discs and note any perceived change in the sound. I'm now up to around 300 hours and so have listened at 100, 150, 200, 250 and 300 hours. I have to admit that there has been noticeable improvement in the sound--the player at 100 hours is not the same machine at 300 hours. What I heard at 100 hours was much more forward, etched and fatiguing than what I hear now. At three hundred hours the player has begun to relax, lay back and become more three dimensional. Inner detail has improved and the machine sounds much more musical and engaging. I have to say that at 100 hours I really did not like the Esoteric. In fact, I was thinking I had made an error in selling my Naim CDX2, which sounded much more musically satisfying by comparison. At 300 hours the player is in another league altogether. Gone is the glare and lack of tonal subtlety. The player now surpasses the Naim in musicality and adds more detail and authority in the bass. I am going to continue to burn the player in solo and listen at 50 hour intervals to see whether there are additional improvements beyond the 300 hour mark. I expect there will be, however slight. Cerrot--it seems you may have had it right on this one!

Dodgealum, the key question is, would you classify the sound of the X-03SE as "unbearable" at the beginning too?

Cheers,
John