Are drivers broken in prior to testing?

[jimluu]

Most hifi equipment including speakers require a certain degree of use before sounding 'right'. I was wondering if Zaphaudio and similar sites have a standard for breaking in the drivers prior to testing.

[Jed]

I know zaphaudio does this.

[TacoD]

The German diy mags also do this.

[jkrutke]

For woofers, I typically do 10 hours at full Xmax, with at least 1/2 hour cooldown time. Sometimes less with drivers that don't have very good ventilation, as they can overheat. After 10 minutes I touch the magnets so see if they are warm. If yes, I scale back the time and Xmax.

What I do is overkill though. Almost the same minor shift in T/S numbers can be had from a simple suspension stretch with the fingers. Note that there's typically no change in linear or nonlinear distortion through the midbass, midrange or treble with breakin, it's only a mild T/S shift that might affect the tuning. For tweeters, I just do a few high level, slow sweeps from 400-4000.

As far as sounding "right" to ears after some time, aside from a bass alignment improving (not very likely) most of that is just ears getting used to the speakers. This subject is flame bait on some forums, particularly if the discussion shifts from speakers to other components. Generally however, I think break-in is overrated and probably not even needed. I do it anyway mostly just to give people one less thing to complain about. :E Heheh, the same reason I still post cumulative spectrum decay charts. :B

[Jed]

Common John, aren't you aware that the molecular structure of the driver changes with breakin thus sidestepping the space time continuum and creating a more spacious soundstage? :W

[jkrutke]

Careful, messing with the space time continuum could affect the black space between the notes.

[A9X]

For woofers, I typically do 10 hours at full Xmax, with at least 1/2 hour cooldown time. Sometimes less with drivers that don't have very good ventilation, as they can overheat. After 10 minutes I touch the magnets so see if they are warm. If yes, I scale back the time and Xmax.

What I do is overkill though. Almost the same minor shift in T/S numbers can be had from a simple suspension stretch with the fingers. Note that there's typically no change in linear or nonlinear distortion through the midbass, midrange or treble with breakin, it's only a mild T/S shift that might affect the tuning. For tweeters, I just do a few high level, slow sweeps from 400-4000.

As far as sounding "right" to ears after some time, aside from a bass alignment improving (not very likely) most of that is just ears getting used to the speakers. This subject is flame bait on some forums, particularly if the discussion shifts from speakers to other components. Generally however, I think break-in is overrated and probably not even needed. I do it anyway mostly just to give people one less thing to complain about. :E Heheh, the same reason I still post cumulative spectrum decay charts. :B

Spot on.

I generally break in drivers just to be sure the T/S parms are stabilised before use. It only costs a bit of power and I usually have plenty of time between the drivers arriving and use in system.

I agree that audible effects of break in are vastly over stated and are ore to do with listeners becoming more comfortable with the speakers in use than an actual physical change in the units themselves.