"Wylie Williams" wrote in message ...
I know that many audiophiles believe that speakers need a period of break-in
to sound their best, while others disagree.
This post is a request for those who believe in speaker break-in to provide
advice, and it is also request that those who disagree allow those of us
they believe to be mistaken to continue in the error of our ways without
comment.
I am breaking in a pair of Gallo Reference III speakers in my garage on 24
hour/day FM music, which I plan to stop at 120 hours. I do this on the
advice of Gallo, and am told by Gallo that more power the better, as they
personally believe in break-in, and several reports they have received say
that for these speakers there is a definite break-in point that must be
reached for best quality. They further recommend using high power for best
results. My problem is that once I bring these into my living room I will
not be able to give them high power very often, as I have a wife who will be
disturbed by the noise. I wish to find the best way to continue the break-in
these speakers a few hours at a time.
While I have hard the general statement that break-in if desirable, I
haven't seen anything specific onwhat to play and how loud. It would be
easy to put a CD on repeat on occasion when we go out. I wonder if anyone
has experience with the best signals to play through speakers for break in.
Music? What sort? Test CDs? Which CDs? Which tracks?
This was recently addressed elsewhere. From my experience with very
many drivers through the years, and from talking to transducer
engineers at some of the main manufacturers, there seems to be little
mechanical break in these days with the typical modern cone drivers
with polymer suspensions. Specifically, Cms and Rms, and thus
indirectly Fs and Qt don't significantly change from 1st hit to after
rumbling around for many hours. Possibly, the hysteresis profile
loosens up with some, but if you allow the cone to move enough this is
also of no importance, Fs won't change. Some have previously referred
to Small's recommendation in his 1973 paper to have the cone barely
moving when measuring T/S but this doesn't apply today and I don't
feel it ever did. Drivers back then had pleated surrounds and were
stiff with small Xmax's so maybe this was precautionary advice. This
small part of the article was not science.
Some dome tweeters do change timbre after some running in, especially
coated fabric, but you can plainly hear them loosen up within a few
minutes. I assume we're discussing high end here, so there will always
be QA testing and very often 2x; before and after assembly. Assembly
line QA testing is also done after some run in and therefore drivers
themselves will not be virgins when you get 'em.
So what's with all those stories about how speakers change after
setup? How about atmospheric conditions changing with setup? Just got
your new speakers in February and you live in Minnesota, well yeah
they're going to "break in" or better said, warm up. Heck even
humidity can change a driver slightly if they were packaged in plastic
and then opened up in a damp environment. Many tweeters absorb some
ambiant humidity and get a bit heavier this way. Damping materials can
shift and slowly settle if oriented differently in the stock room. All
of this is potentially (but not likely) audible but doesn't come from
the drivers themselves, it comes environmental influences on the
drivers.
I'll leave break in of crossover components to those who know better
but that idea intuitively seems quite rediculous to me. As far as
break in program material goes, I'm with Dersu on this one, listen and
enjoy. Music in the emotional lines of celebration would probably work
best. If your new loudspeakers should require break-in, who cares,
they'll do it all by themselves so let them perform for you while
doing so.
If you should want to break an individual driver's cherry prior to the
design process to be sure, high pass filtered pink noise for tweeters
and for woofers / cone drivers +/- 1.5x Fs sinewave rumbling at 2/3
Xmax work well.
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