Cable burn in

Sorry to disagree.

However, ours ears are not constant, they can change how they hear from day to day, even hour to hour, depending on a variety of factors. I’m not talking about permanent changes like hearing damage, age-related hearing loss etc, but other factors which may have a physiological basis, perhaps at some point crossing over into psychoacoustics. A factor most people will have heard very obviously on occasion arises from differential air pressure across the eardrum, which in more extreme Instances manifests as very pronounced difference in sound before and after a yawn (e.g. when either there has been a rapid change in atmospheric pressure or when they have congestion due to a cold etc). Another is exposure to loud sound, which dulls the sounds following to some extent.

All this is before considering the accuracy of memory of sound, with no absolute reference calibrations, and before considering whether there may be any psychological influences at play. Blind testing of course removes the latter, while direct comparison not relying on memory solves the remainder.

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Definitely possible to consider, whether actually the case is another matter - which likely depends on the characteristic that changes, and the equipment used. But as I indicated, in the context of what is being discussed I think it is unlikely.

Such expressions tend to appear in TV dramas, although I did hear one person, who was responsible for his own defence use it quite a lot. I think on that occasion the judge cut him quite a bit of slack, that was until he found against him!

Sorry for the diversion, I’m just trying to lighten this thread up a bit!

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We are doing well this afternoon, now we just need to wait for the sunrise in Australia.

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I am very aware of the mechanics (and neural mechanisms) by which we hear…and how these might vary from day to day or more permanently… whether as a result of either intrinsic or extrinsic factors.
I am convinced that I can separate all of this from the changes in sound resulting from listening using different equipment…and burn in. I have, I would guess, average hearing and hi-fi which seems to be able to make changes obvious.
It would be good if this can be measured though…but, honestly it’s not that important to me. It is interesting though.

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Fun is good…I put that to you.
In summary…

Most of the time I can’t even remember what I ate for breakfast let alone what I heard five minutes ago :relaxed:

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I’m not.

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The great thing is that if this thread leads to agreement between measurements and listening tests on directly comparing unburnt and ‘burnt, cables under well designed and controlled conditions, whatever that may conclude about burn-in. It us a wonderful opportunity!

Fingers crossed that it can be measured and be shown the be reliably audible.
Rafael…after this, it’s off to CERN for you, to detect the next transient sub-atomic particle. We will give you a reference.

I think it is of paramount importance that cable A and B are tested with the bridge to ensure that they give the same readings (identical) at the beginning of the experiment, otherwise we could be comparing apples and pears :relaxed:

Just don’t do it at Arnhem, that would be a bridge too far.

If your test detect nothing, will you still disagree?

I also cross my fingers.

I have several friends working at CERN and actually the institution is one of my customers.

But again, this is not about detecting a neutrino, this is about old electrical engineering.

…no, it’s about detecting the burninino boson!

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That sounds more like a Brazilian dance

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It’s also the pen name of the graviton

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If the test detects nothing, we prove nothing, and we cannot agree or disagree on nothing.

But this is not related to your original question:

I disagree on this one, let me provide some examples.

With instruments we can detect changes in sound pressure (dB) that are well below the threshold of the human ear.

The human ear also measures orientation but we cannot trust the ear for critical applications, we use gyroscopes.

We can also scan the brain and see a change in activity because of a change in the environment, or we can also measure a chemical change in a neuron that is the effect of a change in the environment. The difficult task is to attribute cause and effect.

If you can listen to it, it can be measured. Perhaps it is just not so easy.

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I rather suspect, though, that even if the double blind listening and the measurements showed nothing, there would be those who would insist that it was because there was something wrong with the tests or the equipment, and that burn-in does happen.

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