How long for new 683s to burn in?

[SteelyTom]

I'm curious if anyone has any thoughts on whether there is a burn-in period to begin with for a new pair of 683s, and if so: (1) how long does it take; (2) will a perceptible change in sound quality result after burning-in takes place, and (2) should I baby these guys until the burn-in period is over with? (I'm bi-wiring with a 100w, five-channel Rotel 1565, if that makes any difference.) Thanks for any comments/experiences....

[Opus007]

On my 683's I noticed a improvement after 50 hours and more of a improvement after 100 hours.After 100 hours the bass really opened up and the top end smoothed out a lot.I have had my 683's now for 2 years and it still amazes me on how good these speakers sound.
As for babying them I threw everything I had at them and as loud as I could take it.Others will disagree and suggest to baby them and in hind site if I had to do it again I might baby them to save my ears.The 683's though will play very loud and it is unlikely that you will damage them.Enjoy them and pair them up with some good equipment as they are very good speakers.

[emig5m]

I don't believe in break in as far as needing to take it easy to not do damage. But as someone who has had well broken in floor demos side by side with brand new out of the box 683s I will say the brand new ones did sound noticeably sloppy compared to the used ones (to the point I almost wanted to keep the floor demos complete with their broken grills and slight scuffs over the brand new ones). I say the harder you push them, the quicker they'll loosen up and break in... Something loud and bass heavy should do the trick or just don't worry about it and run them normal and let nature takes its course.

The scientific guys on AVS say speaker break in is total placebo and just "getting used to the speaker". But I had broken in demo speakers first, and then side by side with brand new out of the box of the same model so I know at least with these particular speakers, there was a noticeable break in time. I actually would of sided with the placebo guys if I hadn't had the used ones and then noticed the speakers brand new out of the box sounded sloppier in comparison.

[SteelyTom]

Guys, thanks a lot for the input!.... I'll have to "force" myself to listen to those 100 hours or so of music!

My out-of-box experience of my 683s, fwiw, is that they're a little dry and a little bass-shy, though quite detailed and very smooth in the midrange. Though that could be a function of the large-ish room I have them in, a loft-style apt. with concrete floors.

[Opus007]

Another thing to consider is room dampening and speaker placement.It took me a long time to get my 683's dialed in to the room.Room dampening made a very big difference but speaker placement made even a bigger difference.Just curious but what speakers did you have before that the 683's are replacing?

[theblue]

you said you where bi-wiring. I would suggest you try bi-powering since these speakers really open up with more power. your setup is somewhat close to mine and if you try this I doubt you'll want to drop back to only 100rms.

my 683s sounded great out of the box, they where used in the showroom for a while so it might be that they where already broken in.

[htsteve]

Though that could be a function of the large-ish room I
have them in, a loft-style apt. with concrete floors.

Yes, each of these will have an impact on the sound. If you have bare concrete floors, a simple thing to do is get a rug to put in front of them, to cover the first point refelction on the floor.

Also, are they in corners? Or right next to an entertainment center? Moving them out and away from these should open them up a bit.

Can you post pictures?

[SteelyTom]

I'll work on the pictures. I do have the speakers in a corner, though they're about 4-5 feet each out from the (perpendicular) walls and maybe 8-10 feet apart from each other. The room is pretty resonant-- spare in terms of couches, etc., with tall ceilings. Some good suggestions, folks-- I'll play with speaker placement (within the limits set by the decorator-in-chief GF).

So far no complaints about clarity or detail; if anything I'm a little concerned about the 'oomph' factor, esp. at the bass end. I wonder if the burn-in process will get the low end to open up a little bit. Your comments encourage me on that.

(Pretty sure I'm bi-powering-- I have the 683's t/m powered by sep. channels of my Rotel 5-channel, 100w amp. Just two-way audio for now, hope to expand later). Cables are MIT, nothing special but about 20% of total system cost. Oppo BDP-83 player.

[emig5m]

So far no complaints about clarity or detail; if anything I'm a little concerned about the 'oomph' factor, esp. at the bass end. I wonder if the burn-in process will get the low end to open up a little bit. Your comments encourage me on that.

No, break in is more a subtle change, I would work on setup right away and not wait for some dramatic change from break in. Seating position is as important as speaker position from my experience - closer to the back wall, the more bass, and less bass as you enter the center of the room. Normally a seating position 2/3rds the depth of the room works best overall for me and placing the speakers and seating position in an equilateral triangle with the tweeters pointed just slightly behind your head gives the best overall imaging and smoothest response before touching EQ.

I came from speakers with 15" woofers and the 683s didn't disappoint for bass (probably because I was in shock and awe over the dramatic increase in mid and top end performance). My final setup for my 683s was half plugs in the bass ports to smooth them out a little and take the slight edge off the boominess (full plugs seemed to make them too bass shy and take away from bass dynamics/impact)

I have a smaller room so it's not hard for me to get bass anyway, but I just choose to crossover to a sub anymore that way you can place speakers for best imaging and then the sub is free to move around for the best bass response plus a quality dedicated sub should easily beat out most main speakers way down low anyway. And as crazy as it sounds, I get clearer and more detailed mids and highs when I separate most of the bass from the speakers to the sub - this is probably due to my smaller room and room modes from all the drivers.

But definitely don't wait for something dramatic and magical to happen from break in - it's more subtle....they should be performing pretty good right out of the box....it's mostly all in the room setup. And bass output is so subjective to begin with anyway. I bet a car bass boomer who enters SPL competitions where all you hear is "boom boom boom" with no mids or highs would frown bigtime if he heard a system setup steered more towards accuracy. But on the other side, my friend who is a car bass boomer was thoroughly impressed with my 683s (without a sub and I was playing a nice bass heavy hip hop track) and his exact words was he could hear things in the song that he's never heard before. My father who has only heard lower end brand speakers jaw nearly dropped to the ground when he heard my 685 bookshelf speakers when I was playing around with them as mains, hehe... One day I'll really ruin him for life with a listen to my 804's, lol. :B

I agree with Opus on room dampening... My room the speakers is in is so dampened that just moving the vacuum cleaner from one room to the other nearly eats away half the volume of it going from the hardwood floor more bare room to the carpeted and densely packed room. I have wall to wall carpet with thick under padding (I did the carpet myself so I did two layers of under padding, had to friggin' shim the tack strips with 3/4" and everything, lol), furniture with thick and dense cushions - I have a higher end futon that has an extremely dense 12" thick mattress that's so dense I can barely pick the mattress up by myself and I've worked construction for the past 17 years (the literature to it said something about compressing 22" of materials to make the 12" mattress, lol). I have tons of dispersion with CD cases, computer desks, shelves littered with nick nacks, everywhere there's dispersion and dampening. My reference system is headphones with no room so I know with the performance of my system I have something good going, lol.

[theblue]

(Pretty sure I'm bi-powering-- I have the 683's t/m powered by sep. channels of my Rotel 5-channel, 100w amp. Just two-way audio for now, hope to expand later). Cables are MIT, nothing special but about 20% of total system cost. Oppo BDP-83 player.

yes, that's bi-powering (you just said bi-wiring in your first post).

hmm... sounds like a good setup so far, what is your pre-processor? (give us the rest of the picture as to how you are feeding your amp)

[stuofsci02]

And as crazy as it sounds, I get clearer and more detailed mids and highs when I separate most of the bass from the speakers to the sub - this is probably due to my smaller room and room modes from all the drivers.

Could also be because your amp is not being worked as hard so distortion will drop..

[emig5m]

Could also be because your amp is not being worked as hard so distortion will drop..

Even at low volumes? An Emotiva XPA-5!? 8O I think it's a room mode around the 80/100hz region because it's still there when the crossover to the sub is low, noticeable 80Hz and under and gone at 100Hz crossover so now I crossover at 100Hz, gain more bass punch, and also strangely enough gain more mid and top end clarity.... It's like some "stress" is relieved in the bass region that was masking the mids and highs ever so slightly. My new arrangement has the speakers firing down the long end of the room now so the speakers are closer to the side walls then they normally are (old arrangement had the speakers 44 inches from the side wall and now they're only 21").

[SteelyTom]

No, break in is more a subtle change, I would work on setup right away and not wait for some dramatic change from break in. Seating position is as important as speaker position from my experience - closer to the back wall, the more bass, and less bass as you enter the center of the room. Normally a seating position 2/3rds the depth of the room works best overall for me and placing the speakers and seating position in an equilateral triangle with the tweeters pointed just slightly behind your head gives the best overall imaging and smoothest response before touching EQ.

I've got to address room-dampening and move the 683s around some, even though to date I've followed the rules, e.g. equilateral triangle with listener. Placing against walls isn't an option in the space.... It may also be simply a matter of cranking the speakers-- I've been volume-shy in the initial 'burn-in' process and, compounding that, have played mostly acoustic, analogue material, e.g. 60s-era Blue Note discs engineered by Rudy Van Gelder, who was all about clarity and transparency and doesn't wow you with 'presence'.

I'm finding that the 683s need plenty of power, even at low/moderate volume. I'm not disappointed, so much as concerned that I'm probably not maximizing what I have....

(Rest of system: Rotel RSP 1570 5-channel processor; Rotel RMB 1565 5-channel, 100wpc amp; Oppo BDP 83 player; MIT interconnects; bi-amping with MIT EXP1 cables to t/m inputs, and MIT EXP3 cables to bass inputs.)

[theblue]

have you played with the foam plugs? I have found that just using the outer foam rings gave me best results and many others I've talked to online agree this was best for them also.

and as you said, they love power to crank 'em up. :T