Don't we know it.
If there is one thing that distinguishes an experienced and knowledgeable scientist, it is humility.
I don't think anyone here doubts that you have perceived improvements due to burn-in. But perceiving them does not mean that they really exist anywhere but in your mind.
And the same engineers who design the equipment and understand how it works far better than you and some others here can find no reason to believe that the so-called improvements due to burn-in are real.
So, you like their engineering right up to the point of perceiving something wrong with it.
To repeat post #125, this engineer knows that burn in does happen. Not just to speakers (which everyone agrees on),
but in audio electronics as well. Having had a small business building audio equipment, this was a routine matter
to deal with.
Please do not attempt to speak for me, or for Paul McGowan, or for all the rest of us.
And do not speak for engineers unless you are one yourself.
but in audio electronics as well. Having had a small business building audio equipment, this was a routine matter
to deal with.
Please do not attempt to speak for me, or for Paul McGowan, or for all the rest of us.
And do not speak for engineers unless you are one yourself.
Indeed. Yet sometimes it seems we disagree on exactly what to be skeptical of.
Just an observation. I will leave it at that. Please have a nice day 🙂
I've actually repeated this many times around the Forum, so I totally agree with you.
Also because what today seems false, tomorrow could change its status and become as true.
The fact is that proving certain theses requires a large investment in money and if certain theories do not appear just as a possible and adequate economic return from an industrial point of view (I was about to say, from a military point of view) no industry will invest in it.
Generally speaking, Audio does not seem to be in the top positions for possible investors.
Four years as undergraduate EE at a major engineering school and 1 year as a graduate student as well as a teaching assistant. Plus, experience as an EE working with computers in their early days.
I used to watch Paul McGowan regularly right up until the time he started promoting cable risers. But, of course, maybe you believe in cable risers as well. Do you?
Not exactly.
My point is the following: your comment might be partly correct if you were talking about Civil Engineering, or Mechanical Engineering (the one I studied, although I didn't manage to graduate due to external factors) or Management Engineering, but it is no longer valid at all if you are talking about Electronic Engineering applied to Audio.
Please note that the electronics of a microwave oven either work or they don't work and anyone will have the exact same feedback from using a working (or even not working) microwave oven.
Instead, Audio is addressed to Hearing, and Hearing is a sense.
And as a sense it involves a huge multitude of physiological, psychological, neuronal and cerebral processes, and who knows what else, in addition to a state of general good health.
The real implications and interconnections regarding the functioning of this sense are still far from being fully discovered and understood.
On the other hand, an Audio Electronic Engineer is just an engineer.
Hoping all real engineers don't feel offended here, because I'm just making a point without wanting to take anything away from their skills, commitment, efforts and money they spent to become one: we have some engineers in my family, so I've a natural respect for engineers.
So Audio Electronic Engineer is just an engineer and the cultural short circuit occurs when he knows nothing about Psychology of Perception or even Physiology of Hearing and yet he takes upon himself the undeserved right to pontificate on what he has never studied.
That is not restricted to only engineers, unfortunately it is a problem of many who have been successful in their fields.
They think their success could be replicated in a completely different field, should they choose to try. This is rather unlikely.
And having a degree does not make someone an engineer. Only decades of focus and determination in one's field will do that.
The proverbial 10,000 hours is just a start.
They think their success could be replicated in a completely different field, should they choose to try. This is rather unlikely.
And having a degree does not make someone an engineer. Only decades of focus and determination in one's field will do that.
The proverbial 10,000 hours is just a start.
Components such as resistors, inductors, etc., that are made of solid material do not change their values with burn-in. The purpose of the burn-in is to weed out weak components that fail with early use.
Some capacitors, such as electrolytics, are an exception. Their values do change with early use. However, those changes are rarely, if ever, audible. The large capacitors used in power supplies are there to smooth out AC ripple riding on top of rectified DC voltages and their exact capacitance value is not critical. Variations from nominal are unlikely to be heard.
To be a little more precise for those who do not understand electronics, the audio signal does not go through the power supply where these large capacitors are located.
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You are absolutely right about this. As you have stated what someone "hears" is a huge multitude of the various mental processes that you enumerated.
The electrical engineer is not telling anyone that they don't perceive a difference due to psychological reasons. In fact, that is the very reason that they do perceive a difference. What the engineer is telling you is that there is no measurable difference in the actual sound emanating from the speakers and therefore these claimed improvements are all psychological.
In my opinion an "enlightened" engineer should instead say: at the moment there is no in-depth knowledge about the interaction between the system that reproduces a recorded piece of music and the complex hearing system of a listener and therefore we are not even able to build detection/measurement instruments adequate for the purpose that is in the title of this thread or for any other purpose of similar interest.
And that's all.
P. S.: It's clear to me that you seem to want to agree with your interlocutor just to further your own cause.
So, I'll not comment more than what I said above.
I'm not sure what an "enlightened" engineer is. We didn't have that as a major at my school. We did, however, have electrical engineering and I did quite well in understanding it. It's the same engineering incidentally that brings you the great amplifiers and other high performance audio components that we all enjoy today.
But it's not the electrical engineer's job to deal with, as you put it - "the interaction between the system that reproduces a recorded piece of music and the complex hearing system of a listener". That might be the psychological professional's job, but it's not the engineer's. His is to bring the original recording from its media to the speakers with very little, if any, distortions or other changes to the sound. And that is being done exceptional well with today's equipment. Even modestly priced products perform at very high levels.
The fact that you and others continue to cite the engineers who design your audio equipment as lacking in their job performance is particularly annoying. You clearly don't understand the engineering aspect of audio.
But it's not the electrical engineer's job to deal with, as you put it - "the interaction between the system that reproduces a recorded piece of music and the complex hearing system of a listener". That might be the psychological professional's job, but it's not the engineer's. His is to bring the original recording from its media to the speakers with very little, if any, distortions or other changes to the sound. And that is being done exceptional well with today's equipment. Even modestly priced products perform at very high levels.
The fact that you and others continue to cite the engineers who design your audio equipment as lacking in their job performance is particularly annoying. You clearly don't understand the engineering aspect of audio.
My point exactly.
I'm also not denying anyone's experience. I'm convinced that when people say they hear a difference they genuinely do hear a difference. I'm just inviting them to take a look at alternate explanations for their experience as well, in particular in the cases where science, engineering, and measurements say that the stimulus that reaches their ears isn't any different.
Tom
It is rare that I will read every post in a thread, but I have with this one. My graduate degree is in theological studies and I'm pretty sure going down that path would not be any more controversial than this topic. 😉
If you really believe that I suggest you don't ever get on an airplane again.
I'm sure that Boeing has lots of aeronautical engineers, as well as other types, working on designing their airplanes that don't have each have "decades of focus and determination".
Yes, that difference between theory and practice.
An engineer will perform better after 10.000 hours of operation = Engineer burn-in process. 😀🤣👍
Please note that, apart useless laughing emoticons that yo seems to love, the burn-in is a normal thing for everything on this planet, even for your shoes. 😉
Please note that I say that engineer burn-in process is a real thing. I’m laughing because how apt is that term. He’ll get ‘burned’ many times during the process.
I’m not denying burn-in processes of physical world in any way. Audible results are in question only.
I’m not denying burn-in processes of physical world in any way. Audible results are in question only.
Surely, this is not my fault.
I think instead that personal preferences have nothing to do with it.
When you listen to a piece of equipment, or better, a system the first thing you notice is if it sounds bad.
If so, then you start trying to identify what the elements are that make it sound bad.
Is it the slow, boomy bass?
Is it the recessed, muddy mids?
Is it the scratchy, dry, piercing highs?
Is it even the lack of a credible soundstage?
At the end of the day the Reproduction of Sound can be summarized in just this, imo.
When/if a system sounds good, then it means that the previous 4 things have not happened.
And you can start thinking and deepening about other things eventually existing.