binding post break in

Yeah - be careful - if you are looking for or expecting to hear something then
you often do - our mind plays tricks but its worse our hearing can even play
REAL tricks. There is a little known (at least to audiophiles) muscle in the ear
that probably has the purpose of helping us escape predators or danger. This
muscle tightens in the ear when we concentrate on sound or we are stressed and
it allows us to better hear the mid range frequencies at the expense of the bass
response. A few people can voluntarily control this muscle or have trained
themselves to do so. Many people do not know when it activates or de-activates
but concentration on sound will usually trigger it involuntarily.

Anyway, I simply point this out because people are so eager to jump to
conclusions that have no scientific explanation whilst they may be too quick to
overlook the most obvious ...our own hearing or minute changes in listening
position (a few inches can matter)!

I'll throw in two more possibilities:

1) the binding posts actually do "burn-in" (although this one has really already been floated by the original poster)

2) the new binding posts were cryo treated by the manufacturer.

#2 I actually have a fair bit of experience with, and others that do will also tell you that cryoing cables, receptacles, etc. results in a fairly hyper-detailed but thinned out and etched presentation if the cable or receptacle is inserted back into the system without any burn-in.

The initial sound that Chris describes is very typical of any cryoed cable not subjected to burn-in and the Nextgens may very well be burning in post cryo. There are a number of cable manufacturers that do cryo their wire and identify as such, but there are also manufacturers that cryo and do not identify that their products have been cryoed.

Every receptacle and every piece of wire in my system has been cryoed so I've been through this a number of times. I did replace speaker binding posts with the Eichmann posts a number of years ago. To be honest, I can't recall whether there was a burn-in with the posts; I wish that I had taken the time to cryo those posts but I was impatient and just wanted to get them in and didn't do it.

shandorne, cool post, I have never heard of this muscle, But I have experienced just what you discribed before, Every once in a while I think that something is wrong with my system, then my ears "pop" and then the bass returns, I always thought that my ears were just clogged or something.
usually I have pretty good hearing ,I not that old "37" and can still hear up to 18K but cant hear anything at 20K . I dont think that this is what I am hearing with the binding posts though. the guy who posted about cryoing might be on to something, as what he discribes is closer to what I am hearing with my system , thanks ,chrissain

IME When you disturb the wiring of an amplifier it will have to break in again before you can hear what you did. A lot of people ascribe this break-in period to the part that they installed, but it appears that a lot of the time that is not the case.

If I were you, despite knowing that I had installed the binding post properly, I would still reverse the phase on one channel, just to verify that what I 'know' is correct. Often the reason we can't solve a problem is because what we 'know' as a base assumption is not valid.

Shandorne, I think we all believe that your mind can play tricks on you. However, I am not an audiologist, but as far as I know there are no muscles within the ear. There are bones, canals and nerves. The human escape mechanism usually is initiated by a rush of adrenalin! So what is this muscle you are referring to?