Monday Monologue: Burn In and More Snake Oil
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- Опубликовано: 8 сен 2024
- This week we discuss component burn in, the actual time that very few items actually do need to sound their best + more on cable snake oil.
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My full respect and appreciation for your honesty and willingness to help people understand some basic concepts that will save them a lot of money and make their listening experience free of lies.
Very wise, precious and straightforward words about 200 hours burning in new tubes. Same as on cables l. That's the honest position of a true ace on the subject.
The higher the resolution of your system the longer the burn in time.
I hundred percent agree with you. The worst burn in or audio scam is high-end cables snake oil at it's finest.
That is one nice amp, a definite head turner(eye's wide open), thanks for the audio advice, it's really appreciated. You have one of the best audio channels.
Thank you!
Burn in in aerospace electronics means 15 cycles of minus 54 Deg. C and plus 95 Deg. C. and a functional test would be done at each extreme while the temperature is set to dwell for a couple of hours. The purpose is to artificially age the components so as to weed out the infant mortalities and make the product more reliable, component reliability is a bathtub curve and the aim is to put the components at the start of the flat part of the curve.
My experience of audio equipment is that a power amplifier needs to warm up so as to have the bias currents and voltages stabilise, the voltage across a silicon junction decreases with temperature increase. The most obvious effect would be on the quiescent current through the output pair of a class AB amplifier though I suspect there's more to it than that. As for the sound of film caps chnaging over time - I've not noticed it myself but don't doubt that it happens.
I really appreciate your candor
Right. I did an extensive capacitor upgrade on an MFA Luminescence Preamplifier, replacing all coupling caps (Wondercaps) with REL PAS caps (polystyrene film and foil) as per customer's request. Nasty in the beginning. After extensive burn-in, the preamplifier sounds wonderful. The Luminescence preamplifier is a work of art, and after a parts upgrade, should look as if it was never touched.
Fantastic! Cut the BS. The only good result I've had with shielded power cables is when my interconnects were really prone to EMR (Kimber). Way cheaper to replace my interconnects than all the power cables. Looking forward to the next video!
Good point about capitance of t table interconnects.ihave measured over 80pf. Difference on stock cable that came with various turntable. used the info to determine what cap. The cart was really seeing.
Very good points about cables ...
You are very honest audiophile i trust you 👍
Your common sense is a breath of fresh air
Thanks for this, for me its one of the most challenging things in hifi. Determining what is BS and what is not especially for ppl who are new.
One thing that always pains me is to see people on a tight budget spending a completely disproportionate amount on cables and whatever when they could just replace a coupling cap or upgrade XO components...
Exactly! I've see hifi salesmen saying "You should budget 30% for cables" rather than buying a nicer phono cartridge etc.
I totally agree with this...tons of BS to wade thru in the hifi world. Damn shame too
Hello from Thailand. I was a cable disbeliever before. I tought any good brand low model interconnects can do fine so I bought a new pair of AQ Big Sir RCA. The cable burn-in period was true about 10-15 hours. Then, I found a pair of used mid-level AQ Makenzie for the price of Big Sur so I could sell it with minimal lost of money. It's more tight bass, more detail, clearer sound. Then, I found used AQ Water for a half-price of MSRP. It's another level of realism. I swapped them back and forth. No snake oil to me. I wishes they are so I don't have to buy more. Makenzie plus Water cost me about the same as a new AT33PTG/2 MC cartridge. Now, I'm think of DIY Rega tonearm rewiring.
Sigh... OK.
Just got a set of $25 World's Best interconnects. They are great and as good as one needs.
Hallelujah! I've always felt the same way about power cables. People claiming a piece of wire needs to burn in??? You've got hundreds of feet of romex in your walls - why would anyone expect the last few feet of some "magical" cable to make any difference at all. It is ridiculous.
Never mind the MILES of wire from the power station!
I recently finished my Kegger SE KT88 and was a bit shocked to hear how bad much of the high frequencies sounded. And of course, there was a bit of panic and I checked voltages again, tried adjusting the feedback resistor..down to 150k and again down to 100k. Tried bypassing the electrolytics....all of this with no effect on the harshness that was making me wince. Although, bypassing the 220uF cathode bypass did seem to add a touch of body to the sound. Finally, after about 2 weeks of playing as much as possible...probably at least 60 to 70 hours...the harshness started to disappear. The only thing that kept me sane was playing certain music that didn't seem to excite the issue...Norah Jones and Diana Krall sounded incredible...small jazz, that kind of stuff. So I kept faith that somehow it would come around and now seeing the reward but still a little way to go. Caps in this case are the Mundorf M Cap Supremes. Amp has an amazing amount of detail, yet still has a very natural quality...exactly what I expect from great tube gear.
Good morning !!! Great job you do, excellent !!! About the cables. After many changeings of those big fancy, fat and expensive cabels I finally found the best sounding cabels and those are american Anticablese. They look just "skunkie" but are sounding heavenly ( question of dielectricts etc..) They did make a big improvement of sound in my system. Especially with power cord. Cabels are important, whatever the other say. It is not autosugestion, it is reality.
So did you replace the miles of "power cords" to your house too?
No, just the cables that connect the amp and preamp to the 'house power'. Good quality and well made ofc and occ copper cables made my system sound richer, warmer, cleaner and more open. The 'standard' ones sounded dry and thin. I found a couple of excellent, not expensive and good quality Chinese cables and I'm happy. Because they sound better !!
6:25 If, somehow, RFI is getting into the amp from the AC line, the cure is simple: Put an RFI filter at the input. Making one is easy. Put a choke in each side of the line, and caps on each side of the chokes, to gnd. There are variations of this, like with toroids, common-mode chokes, etc, you can come up with, if you know basic electrical theory. Also, you can check the waveforms on the line with a 'scope. For the "hot," use a H.P. filter, to eliminate the 120V 60Hz. That's not needed for the "neutral," which is at gnd potential for the AC (RF is a different story, which is what you're interested in). By the way, if you check the 60Hz AC, you might be surprised, bewildered, and utterly disgusted! It all depends on where you live. I've lived in places, mainly out in the boonies, where the "sinewave" looked like the scrawling of a distorted triangle wave, made by a drunken engineer, just before he passed out. (I know, from personal ex... Oooops! Forget I said that... :) ).
I have noticed burn in on caps but more specifically silver mica caps that I have used in feedback circuits. Also transistors definitely have a burn-in...
I think you and I are on the same page in regards to snake oil. I have a nice set of cables I made. Shielded on one side to ground protecting all of the conductors. I have even noticed a difference on XLR.
Howdy.
Film capacitor burn in.
There is a phenomenon in electricity called gleaming, shining. This happenes at sharp points or corners in conductors carrying high voltage. The electrical field strength becomes so high locally that micro discharges happen. A well known problem in high voltage cables. Therefore HV cable cores have a layer of semiconducting material first, and only after that is the insulation.
So I wonder whether capacitor burn in is about gleaming. Sharp edges of the plates micro gleam locally. Perhaps the gleaming burns away the sharp microedges and turns the metal and dielectric into semiconducting soot that eventually quenches the gleaming.
My thinking about cables is that cables do matter. Assuming the gear is the best of high end. But I should say that there is no such thing as cable burn in.
Regards.
Ive experienced burn in when upgrading coupling caps on my preamp. I feel it was about 400 hours before they mellowed out, some interesting changes in that time, Sonicap's. Still going to get some fancy power cables, open to a disappointing experience ;)
Thanks Skunkye finally someone who denounces this nonsense.
The power cord BS especially drives me crazy. The same people who want to see measurements on everything, are suddenly silent when it comes to power and speaker cables!
@@SkunkieDesignsElectronics
the phase ! I go crazy when I hear people say "phase" the system! There is confusion with the eventual "dispersion" on the frame.
12:35 one of my favorite hobbies is looking at the masses of overeducated engineer, PhD mathematician physicist Audiophile snobs over at Audio gone posting endless treatises on how this that or the other five or $10,000 power cable does exactly what the manufacturer says it will do and more. Of course you also need a $5000 power conditioner and a Puron power whatever the heck it is thing plugged into your open socket on your wall outlet and a three or $500 fuse. Do you want to get them really riled up mention Amir and Audio science review and you’ll get ratioed down to absolute zero in no time. Thanks for this Stephe, I always enjoy your input on stereonet, and have done almost all the mods you recommended for the Wilsenton R8 amp and I’m enjoying it greatly. Keep up the good work.
I need to just go through some of these websites, this one I was just looking at has these special LAN cables and these other $500 a pop things to put into the empty LAN ports in your router so they lower the noise floor in your system... Do these folks even understand how IP networks operate? Clearly not.
www.kempelektroniksshop.nl/accessories/terminators-caps/acoustic-revive-rlt1-lan-terminator-1544.html
As your resolution of you system goes up your mind set changes
Glad you didn't mention the Velocity Factor of wire.
Oh, what I forgot to mention... the way you describe how capacitors change the sound after formatting shows that you have absolute pitch! Not many people notice that! Based on this knowledge, I would trust you to adjust or repair my devices anytime. But that also comes from the fact that I'm almost 60 years old and know how to seek the best advice back when these devices were still available in stores.
I build tube amplifiers myself and yes,coupling caps do need a period of time to sound their best.Also implement two stage filtration in my power supply.
I regards to cables as I make them and speakers also,but with highend cables I suspect the manufacturer adds a small capacitor to the actual speaker cables to change tonality,so basically turning the cables into an equalizer.
Hello, are you me? I know all about agreement bias, but I do have to say that I agree with you almost entirely. Being an electronics engineer, and having spent 35 years plus playing with audio and hifi, I find it is astonishing that people believe in so much marketing hype. Great video, love your thoughts and videos, many thanks x
Sometimes people misunderstand it when inappropriate technical terms like 'burn-in' are applied to capacitors. The correct term to use would be 'formatting.' In the early years of tube technology, this process was applied in production.+thx for the vid.
I cycle all capacitors before I install them for are good reason, make sure they are good at the voltage they are rated for. I use a Heathkit IT-28 and the Sencore LC102, the IT-28 is a quick check at voltage and the Sencore is used for more complex testing like the ESR and real capacitance.
i have had issues with cables not very often but in the 35 years of playing with different electronics i did have issues one is with the cheap cable that come with cd players or tape decks were i would be listening to music and one channel would get static so i would replace the rca cables with some 10 dollar cables and it would cure the problem the other was the cheap coax cables that would come with a tv or cable box sometimes you would see a bit of snow appearing on the screen and some channels would not be clear so i would get a better quality coax cable and it fixed the problem but you don't need to buy high end worth hundreds of dollars just something a little better again only spending 20 bucks maybe and all was good :)
Correct, the $1 RCA cables are pretty junky but once you spend $25 or so, that's all you need.
If that 200 hours burn-in was a thing for tube amps, then the manufacturer would do this to tubes en masse and then measure and match them before selling, ready to plug in and use. I've never heard of that being done in the old days, so it's safe to say it's just audiophile marketing.
You're right on the money with capacitance in the turntable interconnects. That's a pretty high impedance connection (typically 47k), some extra picofarads of cable capacitance may change the tone.
Mr Carlson's Lab recently did a patron-only video on cables. The quick non-discombobulative shield test is a nice one: if you connect a cable to the amp and it hums when you grab it, it ain't good. He also mentioned using video cables for audio connections, a cheap way of making the system sound better. I'm tempted to make a pair of interconnects for my TT, using some H155 or RG58 antenna cable (if I find good quality one, with nice tight shield) and Nakamichi RCA plugs I once salvaged from a trashed audio patchbay. Making nice things on the cheap :)
Sweet 🎉
Thanks Skunkie
On film capacitors where you need the value to hold still with time, here is what I did in the past.
Place the capacitor in the hot box for an hour or so at 50C.
Move the capacitor straight from the hot box to the freezer are about -10C and leave it an hour.
Move the capacitor straight from the cold to the hot again for about an hour.
After you do this, most of the age related value change will be over with.
Yup! Are you breaking in your speakers, or are your speakers breaking in you? 😂
I tell you what, had I know 30 something years ago what I know today I shoulda got in the cable business 😂 Although realistically I couldn't sleep at night doing what some of these manufacturers do. And yeah I'm a fan of World's Best, other than a couple Blue Jeans the rest of my cables are made by World's Best..but they do say something like 250 hours, but also have a lifetime warranty (so they say) I've always been convinced companies say the long burn-in time so you miss the return date like you mentioned. I will say I tried some V-caps recently that sounded absolutely phenomenal right away the first night I listened to them but have sounded like absolute garbage the last couple days. Maybe have 36 hours on them.. hopefully they smooth out soon or they are getting the heave-ho.
Amen !
I Spent lots of money on some very nice caps. They sounded awful, made your ears bleed at first, after a day or so they wete very nice, balanced and transparent. Caps definately burn in. The russian PIO's less so I have found.
Yep, caps do need some time to settle in.
I use a Marantz 7T to Burn-In/Formatting films which I put around 100hrs-150hrs (why not). I find that Cooper or Silver materials "DO" need additional time to settle down/open up. In some instances, it's also easy to compare Stock Films to Upgraded Films (Willsenton R300B only has 3 Films to switch out). For RCA' s I make my own using Belden 8402 (Microphone cable) and speaker cable Belden 9497 or DH Labs Cable Odyssey. On gear that needs time to Burn-In, I am not going there as again, Tubes, Films do need to "Open Up" so, whether it's 25hrs or 200hrs let your ears be your guide.
Ya it’s getting ridiculous these days, one guy on line is pitching $80,000 Speaker cables. Absolutely insane. 😳
And then someone in the comments lit me on fire for laughing at that ridiculous nonsense.
You need to burn in the cables, because when the electrons ride through it the first time the tunnel lights aren't built in yet. So the the poor and scared guys do have to lay out a power line and bulbs and sockets first before they are to travel happily through the big, bad, dark and creepy copper tunnel.
Yepp. That's how it is.
Glad those electrons are trained electricians!
@@SkunkieDesignsElectronics They're true naturals at it.
I was shocked at how quickly the measurement of tubes totally stabilize. I measured three full sets of new tubes in a very clean pre-amp and there was no change at all after the first hour or two, much less difference than between two identical branded tubes. I guess I learned to my surprise that tubes don’t really burn in so much as they just age and start to slowly degrade over time.
Right, they really do stabilize pretty quickly. Plus there is a difference between warm up and burn in. The 300B-Z tubes I listen to need to warm up for about 15 minutes (no music) before they really sound nice. But as far as burn in, a couple of hours was it.
I've had several pairs of brand new speakers that sounded like absolute garbage right out of the box. After a few weeks they sound wonderful. Is it just me getting used to a horrible speaker? I don't think so. I've had other new speakers that sound great when they're brand new. You didn't mention speakers in this vid, just wondering what your experience has been with that?
Speakers absolutely need to break in and so do phono carts. Glad you mentioned that, I'll do those mechanical/audio devices break in a future video.
Speakers have a crossover network that have capacitors in the crossover,better designed speakers use poly caps,instead of electrolytic caps,but also the speaker driver surround it's self becomes more pliable over time.
I know old wax paper coupling capacitors are horrible and are not stable but the new plastic film and other new types are much more superior at insulating DC voltage but never heard of them formatting themselves. I always thought that if they're a large enough value they will allow all of the low and high frequency to pass
Be careful not to just use really big ones, as that can hurt how clean the top end sounds. You want then just large enough for the impedance they are driving to not roll off the low end. Not all brands/types of coupling caps need break in time, but some do.
Okay. My guess is the DC restoration will be slow on the grid with a large value and cause the high frequency to be chopped up. I'm more used to repairing TVs and its funny how critical the horizontal and vertical deflection circuits are but doesn't require capacitor formatting but is critical in high end audio. I've repaired some tube audio before and I guess I don't have an ear for it but I replace with the same values. I did notice a difference in a RUclips video on the use of bumblebee verses newer caps in guitar tone circuits but it was subtle. Guitar players are hard to please hahahaha 😆
Honestly I think this cap issue only applies to certain brands/construction. The basic $2 MPK caps don't seem to exhibit this need for burn in. I doubt you are installing something like Mundorf Alum/oil foil cap in a TV deflection circuit!
@@SkunkieDesignsElectronics oh okay I understand now. The high dollar ones. 😆 that would be expensive for a TV. I don't have experience with those.
Love your common sense and your honesty! I have a complain, though. You promised a comparison between the R8 and X7 and...nothing. Still like your channel, regardless.
waiting to actually get time to take the X7 over to my friends house with the R8. It's going to happen.
What about speakers? I have a valid experience with speakers burn in. It took some time definitely more than 20 hours... Thanks for the video
Oh absolutely speakers take a while to break in, same with phono carts and anything with mechanical parts like that.
Fabulous videos, really enjoying learning, thank you. Quick question what supplier do you use for your power and output transformers?
I've ben using Hammond for power transformers and mostly Edcor for outputs but my latest build has some Thermionic labs. The best I have used though are some Hashiomoto.
It's become so normalized to spend so much money on cables in the last 30 years that people's feelings have become their belief which means it's become fact which is completely wrong. You see it in everything especially people have buyers remorse and have to convince themselves that they're $2,000 power cable changes anything
Are You familiar with Dennis Morecroft gear? They don't make tube amps but they had very thin if not to say flimsy interconnects and LS cables. They almost look like taken from a LEGO technics kit with their red n blue isolation. I used them at the very beginning of my hi fi journey. When it comes about burning in LS chassis, I hope, in a couple of days my pair of Dayton Audio exciters improve their sound. If not, they were a waste of time and money.
IMHO if something sounds bad after 2 days/10 hours of use, it's not going to transform into wonderful.
If you want to give it a go. I can make you a power cable that you'll hear a difference immediately. It has everything to do with the least resistance
So you replaced the cable from the fuse box to the outlet with this same cable as well? And out to the transformer at the street? How many amps does your system draw at normal listening levels to need a monster power cable? Like I said you just need a cable good enough/large enough gauge for the system.
I use Blue Jean Cable and World's Best Cables. Great stuff for a great Price!
Yup!! Simple quality.
An example...GR REASEARCH Tube connectors 50 u.s.$ a pair...
Have you ever seen him explain these? :P
Oh ,yes ! Claims that a single metal nut on the inside of a speaker jack[magnetism] will smear the sound... So you NEED them tube things... Maybe he's right but 80.00CDN$ for jacks ,plastic to boot... @@SkunkieDesignsElectronics
First love your channel BUT as in a capacitor at the joints (solder) needs to have electron flow to normalise copper to solder what is being heard (seen) is the normalising of two different metals. Seen I through a distributor sold some cables to a Video file over 20 years ago he reported a clarity of images. Just saying. I do not sell cable and made a very modest income from them. My humble advice is whatever cables u like solder plug top and IEC ends for best results.
It's not the solder joints in a cap that are forming/burning in. That is shown by the fact that some types of caps have zero burn in time, and others take hours.
Howdy again.
I feel obligated to stick to the truth.
GR-Research claims there is power cable burn in.
Blimey that hurt ...
Perhaps there is another mechanism at work here. Could it be that it takes some time for the molecules in the dielectric to get aligned ? To say it in scientific terms. The molecules reach their highest entrophy. Maybe the dielectric shows least amount of hysteresis when the molecules are in their highes entrophy state ?
Regards again.
Try entreq ground boxes, come with wood finish plugs on special cables of course. Mindblowing stuff, you cannot unread it.
HAHA, they sell them to match the weight of the gear they are grounding!
@@SkunkieDesignsElectronicsThey are already perfectly capable of breaking Ohm's & Kirchoff's laws, I believe warp drive engine prototype may be on the drawing board...
Love it!!
There is one YT channel where the guy has spent $80,000 on one speaker cable and he says the is a huge change going from $50,000 to the £80,000 speaker cable.😂😂😂😂😂😂
Right... like you you add up how huge all these changes are, a set of speaker cables will make the sound stage so wide you can no longer hear the musicians!
Good Job😮 so much bad advice out there from people that can't even turn a screwdriver
I can troubleshoot a pin hole nick in a 4000 foot cable on devices that work on micro amps & millivolts
Finally some sense in a nonsensical world, I'd add this: use cables that come with your gear and if there isn't anything funky going on with the sound then that's the best cable you'll ever going to hear regardless of price and colour of the cable.
Here is an active power cable with a shuman generator and far infrared nanomineral insulation for only 3K!
www.kempelektroniksshop.nl/telos-audio-design-quantum-active-power-cable.html
If an interconnect or speaker cable changes the sound, it's not doing its job.
Exactly!
need some one way audio cable will work
There are people who are looking for audio nirvana and will spend zillions ! I don't get it .
That amp looks neat.. Was the chassis easy work with to mount all the hardware and the TL Iron?
Yes it was
The only audio equipment that usually requires time to run in are devices with moving parts - turntables and speakers for example, devices that will loosen up a little with usage.
I've wasted a lot of money on mains cables over the years. The only ones to make a difference has a ferrite infused insulation.
The difference they made was a few db reduction to the noise floor with the volume cranked to the max. Obviously without a record playing. Through normal listening there was no noticeable improvement.
So was the ferrite insulation actually filtering, or was it more starving the current? Be interested to hear what you think on that.
In the manual of some hifi equipment they actually recommend against using fancy mains cables particularly the woven types like kimber ect.
As for interconects I do like to spend out a bit going between the tonearm and phonostage. I think here it does make a difference. Particularly with low output moving coils.
My guess would be the amp used skimped somewhere in the power supply filtering.
Haha, it’s unbelievable how much you can spend on Cables, but not much good if your ears are warn out!
I find it hilarious the "audiophiles" making all these ludicrous claims are a whole bunch of old farts that can't even hear a thing past 10khz. If they can't hear it, or measure it, how is that even possible.
You will enjoy my Monday monolog this week :)
@@SkunkieDesignsElectronics Can't wait!
I also think that hundreds hours of burn in is marketing BS. Yes you only get accustomed to it.
Hi Skunkie. This video is not good for your BP hehe. Yah it's insane.
I think the major cause for these myths to loop is what we call synergy, which is system dependent right?
Until someone can scientifically measure synergy and mathematically calculate it, this earth will stay flat haha.
More power to your channel.
Wow! The woo is strong in Telos-Audio and even rivals Shun Mook Audio for nonsense products. You can be assured that as soon as a company offers a product with the word 'Quantum' in its name, it will be complete and utter BS.
The Quantum stickers to apply on the tops of caps are my favorite.
No
You don’t listen for two weeks.
You put it on in the background. Let it play without listening. Months of burn in? Nup.
Ummm no… there is lots of going on in a power cables, and yes there are many examples online. Oh dear, you do need an upgrade of an experience lol. Oh well let’s agree to disagree.
So what exactly is "going on" in the last 2 feet of cable between the wall outlet and the amp?