Have your say & ask the experts

Hi guys, I am currently tossing up between the B&W 684s and the B&W 683s.  Anyhow, my question is - they say that new speakers need to time to break in.  I was always curious how long that period is? 

I have found between 40 -60 hours along with burning in the speaker cables.

I think it differs between manufacturers - I was advised to run my EPOS for between 80-100 hours. I just took my time.

Difficult one this. Similar discussions have taken place on the forum before - and I don't think there's a definitive answer. There are various factors involved i.e. make, how loud? and one or two members even suggest it might be a case of just adapting to the sound? I don't know, but I heard a distinct difference with mine after about 2 weeks.

We've measured loudspeakers to see if they change over time and found that, to all intents and purposes, they don't. The resonance may drop very slightly, but not enough to be significant. Therefore the conclusion is that they don't change but the owner does; he gets used to the vagaries of his speakers and this experiment done at Cambridge University shows how.

I recommend that you try it several times until you understand how year ears to adapt to correct shortcomings in the source.

http://www.mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk/~mattd/sine-wave-speech/

I believe this accounts for the strength of arguments about "musical emotion" versus measurement etc. Most of us believe that years of careful auditioning has produced a superb system when it may not be at all, because we haven't understood what our ear/brain combination has done to correct it. Measurement people knows theirs is best because they can prove it and the "musically involved" brigade know theirs is best because they can hear it.

This is why we argue so strongly for measurement and that distortion is the enemy. The more there is, the harder we have to work to remove it, so if our system really has much lower distortion (and more is closely replaying what was recorded) we'll enjoy listening to it more and for longer.

Ash

Ashley James:

Most of us believe that years of careful auditioning has produced a superb system when it may not be at all, because we haven't understood what our ear/brain combination has done to correct it.

So when we like something we hear, actually we don't, it's just our brain telling us we like it...

There is no spoon.

Actually, what Ashley says makes quite a bit of sense to me - there are aural illusions (stereo is one for starters) as well as optical ones.

 Some people actually like the effect that 'distortion' has on the sound. This surely would explain the existence of very high end valve amplification, with very low power output.

I can sort of understand the priciple of sonic and visual illusion. I spent 15 years working in the Lithographic print industry. . . but how do you equate and rationalize the philosophy when it comes to the manufacturers themselves. Does that mean that AVI isn't really that good, it's just Ashley's brain telling him its good. If so, what, in that case, makes a good system? Or is it all figment of our imagination?

Sorry, but I'm really struggling with the concept.

I realise that this is an area where people rise rather too easily but I'll give an analogy. If you're talking to someone in a noisy pub, you have to concentrate hard to ignore the background noise to pick out his voice. It's the same with hi fi only not so bad and you don't realise you're doing it.

Please repeat the Cambridge experiment and think about what I've said, because it's fact and proved. It's also wrong IMO to assume you enjoy distortion, because in the long term you don't.

By the time the average male is 35 years old his hearing sensitivity at 3kHz has dropped by a factor of ten, he's going deaf slowly, it goes on getting worse and at the same time he loses the ability to withstand high SPLs. As your ears deteriorate so the brain has to work harder to process the information it receives. Therefore the older or deafer you are the more obvious it becomes that there is tremendous advantage in having very accurate and neutral hi fi. Younger people have better hearing so can tolerate horrid portable TVs etc, when it's causing DAD and MUM pain!

You may think you enjoy distortion, but presented with a worthwhile improvement in sound quality and given time to adjust, you'll find you much prefer it. It's hard to imagine but it's true and that's the reason the term High Fidelity was coined, it means a greater faithfullness to the original recording/performance. And that's the rub, for far too long no one appears to either have described the goal or how to achieve it, instead misleading terms like musicality etc have been used as a way of avoiding the issue. We, as more and more people do, think it should stop and that a return to basics is needed. It's happening in the USA already and it's beginning to happen in the UK.

Ash

Any object that has to perform movement as a part of its performance HAS to be run-in. Think about it, the bass driver on the speaker (and to a smaller extent the tweeter) has to essentially loosen up...

And I have scientific proof for it too:

http://www.vikash.info/audio/audax

Nice little line from the matrix there Prof, don't think I wouldn't spot it, hehe.
I have heard that if you listen to a particular type of sound for so long that your brain adjusts to make it more audible to your ears. So basically if your system is pants to start with then your hearing is buggered for knowing the differences between good and bad? hmmmm scary

Hmm - "any object that has to perform movement .... has to be run in?" I think not!

 

I guess where I'm coming from is, if I think my system sounds great, does it matter if someone else disagrees with me? Not in my mind, hence why I, and most people on the site tell people to audition something for themselves before buying.

Now of course I can improve on my system, I have absolutely no doubt about that and that is why we upgrade our kit. But I don't really see how knowing that my brain may be tricking me helps when auditioning? Are you telling me instead of going to my local hi-fi shop and listening, I should be taking it to a lab, plugging it into equipment and reading a load of measurements and graphs before I decide? If so, thanks but no thanks, I'm quite happy to go on being deceived by my brain and only thinking that I'm listening to a good sound.

Honestly, load of rubbish if you ask me! Maybe I'm missing the point or just getting old...

Taksinridgeback:

Hmm - "any object that has to perform movement .... has to be run in?" I think not!

 

To a certain extent - name me an example of something which doesn't! CD player? Car components? A washing machine? Even doors on houses have to be moved a few times to get the movement smooth - rubbing items cause friction which can heat and object and cause it to change shape...a book's spine? A turntable cartridge? A guitar? A printer? You name it, it has to run-in to perform at its best!