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Amp Burn-In?

lesmarshall

lesmarshall

Feb 26, 2011
120
37
#1
I understand it can take literally 200 hours or more of actual playing time for stereo home audio amplifiers ( both solid state and tube) to burn in before they sound their best . Does anyone know if this is true for solid state bass amps and/or tube bass amps? I must say , my MB F-500 sounds much better to me now after some significant playing than it sounded when it was brand new .
 
#4
Sounds like a call for Tink again.

Tinkerbell.jpg
 
#7
It shouldn't matter with SS, with tubes , yeah maybe a little play time before they sound their best. I never heard a big difference after any break in period. I do have some serious audiophile friends though who won't even listen to anything (headphones, amps, speakers etc) without a good break in period. They swear it makes a huge difference. I can hear it in headphones but that's about it.

Basically if you hear a difference go for it, If not , don't worry about it.
 
#8
grendle said:
It shouldn't matter with SS, with tubes , yeah maybe a little play time before they sound their best. I never heard a big difference after any break in period. I do have some serious audiophile friends though who won't even listen to anything (headphones, amps, speakers etc) without a good break in period. They swear it makes a huge difference. I can hear it in headphones but that's about it.

Basically if you hear a difference go for it, If not , don't worry about it.
Click to expand...



That's where I heard it from too , from various dealers of audiophile equipment. I must say, in the audiophile world, it is accepted as truth, not myth, that audiophile equipment needs to be played for a number of hours to sound its best , even if it's just played thru head phones. Perhaps it's because of the high fidelity nature of this equipment .
 
#14
SurferJoe46 said:
Yeah - and those same audiophiles swear that black wires have better electron carrying capacity than red ones.

Nutso in my book.
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Here's a quote from an audiophile forum


"Internal wiring has dielectric properties, and requires a "burn-in" period to reach optimal sonic performance. This sonic improvement is real, and can be easily heard in many instances. I've read that Bryston runs all their new gear for 100 hours before any of it leaves the plant. "
 
#15
lesmarshall said:
Here's a quote from an audiophile forum


"Internal wiring has dielectric properties, and requires a "burn-in" period to reach optimal sonic performance. This sonic improvement is real, and can be easily heard in many instances. I've read that Bryston runs all their new gear for 100 hours before any of it leaves the plant. "
Click to expand...

I SURE HOPE SO! Otherwise all those wires would short out against each other.:rollno:

I think I'll sell a line conditioner to these guys to align the electrons from the scattered power grid. Sonic sound stage improvement you can HEAR. (If anyone steals this idea I want a cut). A couple NEO magnets should do the trick.:hyper: :scowl:
Burn-in is done at the plants to find failures before they leave the factory. :cool:
 
#16
seamonkey said:
Solid State amplifiers and pre-amps do Not need a burn in, home stereo, or MI

Ears do.
Click to expand...

+1


OP, this myth is pushed by marketeers for this reason.....it takes that long for your ears and brain to accept your new sound as your usual sound you want to hear instead of comparing it to your old sound and hearing it as something different, and thus, possibly lesser in some way. It is completely psychological and nothing to do with the properties of electronic equipment. There is a term for this that escapes me....something to do with comparative familiarity.

Speakers do actually need a little break-in time for the physical suspension to lossen up/settle in, but this happens after 12-20 hours of use, or say, maybe 3 gigs where they get used/made to work.

Tubes in tube amps folks say need "burning in". This is again not to do with the tube, but for the circuit parts to get brought up to temp., used, and make any final bias adjustments if anything drifted a little bit. Again, no hundreds of hours, just by using the amp, and has plenty of mythology tied to it.
 
#18
B-string said:
I SURE HOPE SO! Otherwise all those wires would short out against each other.:rollno:

I think I'll sell a line conditioner to these guys to align the electrons from the scattered power grid. Sonic sound stage improvement you can HEAR. (If anyone steals this idea I want a cut). A couple NEO magnets should do the trick.:hyper: :scowl:
Burn-in is done at the plants to find failures before they leave the factory. :cool:
Click to expand...

WAIT! WAIT! Cow magnets!

They were all the rage to keep the molecules of gasoline in line as it traveled through the gas lines of your engine so you'd get extra mileage from your cars. This was during the last time there was a real oil shortage.

Now --- since that fad has gone into the long drop, I bet some enterprising person can repackage cow magnets as electron combing devices for amplifiers.

Maybe it can cure mismatched cabs too! Wow! What a wide open market!

I can't speak for better gas mileage - but that can be worked out later on.

Who wants to design the packaging?
 
#20
lesmarshall said:
That's where I heard it from too , from various dealers of audiophile equipment. I must say, in the audiophile world, it is accepted as truth, not myth, that audiophile equipment needs to be played for a number of hours to sound its best , even if it's just played thru head phones. Perhaps it's because of the high fidelity nature of this equipment .
Click to expand...

Let's see, why would this be? Could it be because they don't want the customer to bring it back after a few days when they realize it doesn't sound better than the $400 Pioneer amp they replaced? "No, you have to have at least 200 hours of break-in before it really comes into its own. Just give it a few weeks and it will blow you away."

Of course, after a few weeks, the customer doesn't remember how the Pioneer sounded, and this new audiophile gear must sound better, right? "After all, I paid $15,000 for it."
 

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