Do interconnects and cables wear out?

With all the break-in qualities changing, does that continue and wear out an interconnect?

[hugobloemers]

I would put a caveat on that: As long as you store them right. Don't let them oxidize in a damp environment. We have all seen it, grandma's bed side lamp with a transparent twin cable. Only the copper inside is brown or even green and the insulation has yellowed.

[stephenwong]

Hey, Paul, you must have enough money to buy 2 sets of cables, one breaks in for 100 hours, another set to put aside, then, do a faithful blind test and report results here!

[prebdor]

On the subject of break-in, on any audio equipment, I wonder how much of the perceived improvement over time is just us getting used to the sound.

[gotham]

The copper used in most cables can oxidize over time. I remember the old original Monster Cable speaker wire with the clear extruded dialectic would slowly turn brown and then eventually green after a few years.

[artyfhartie]

A few years ago, I bought better quality interconnects. At first, I did not notice any difference but next day, the sound was fuller, deeper, spatial and gutsy. It's been the same ever since. Not placebo effect or imagination. Just better made and better quality. And not expensive at all. Really worth it.

[georgeradulescu]

Burn-in is truly phenomenal. It only happens in the audio industry, and it only gets to sound better.

[chrislj]

I had some Audioquest speaker cables and interconnects that I bought back in the '90s that had been stored in their original packaging for around 20 years. When I pulled them out awhile back the speaker cables were fine but the blue outer insulation on the interconnects had turned into a gooey slime on the surface. I could not get them cleaned so I threw them out. I've run into other synthetic materials that have had a similar reaction over time.

[AnalogueGround]

Well, it started off well then the ‘cable burn-in’ bit appeared. If the dielectric changes over time then that would have a massive effect at RF frequencies so why doesn’t it concern avionics engineers and cellular comms guys?

[Sigmatechnica]

I had some cheap speaker cable, the type with the clear PVC insulation where the copper inside went green and tarnished over time. think it was a reaction to the UV in light coming through the window starting to break down the plastic

[gprojectnoob]

Something i have always thought about on the burn in of cables was that what is happening is the wire is annealing. Like any metal when it is exposed to heat cycles ( and maybe in this case electrical cycles) it anneals. When the wire is made its hot and then cooled pretty fast, its heated again whether its going through a braid machine or when the wire is coated with an insulator. It goes through all kinds of heat variables during manucturing. I always thought it would be a great experiment to test the hardness of the wire before and after burn in. Maybe there is something going on where the cable hardness and resistance equalize through heat and/or just running current through it. Can you take a set of cables and just run straight DC through it to break it in? Not expecting an answer just thinking out loud. Love these videos !!!

[Ultrafrozen]

I wonder if "break-in" is more a fact that a listener's ear gets accustomed to a particular new sound signature over time and less an actual measurable change. If break-in is real then would the component not continue to change, get better or worse over time?

[HiFiInsider]

cheaply made cables do wear out if the gold plating is low quality and the copper wires may oxide if it is poorly made. I've had name brand cables with these issues.

[Mikexception]

Those 5-10 years old may be produced with insulation made form recycled plastics bearing in mind that they should desintegrate within 10 years. It is trigged by sunshine.

I have two identical plastic parts purchased together - one still in my room as mechanical support and other I kept hidden id dark with spares. First is breaking in dust at touch of finger and other is rigid and hard as new, .

[H.]

I always see your workplace or office and wonder what you do there.

[CaseyRevoir]

I can enchant the high hats in your Sussudio with my Estrata circuit breakers for the house. In ordinary breakers, the springs behind the contacts resonate the supply voltage, causing jitter in your DAC.

[Jenny_Digital]

Could the dialectic be absorbing charge via hot carriers and slight DC bias, leading to reduced capacitance?

[flargosa]

Cable burn in never made sense to me, until I bought a second pair of identical silver rca cables. It sounded different from my first pair though they were identical. I was told to play signal through them, so I did for two weeks straight, lol. Then surprising the new cable sounded the same as my first pair. With some brands new and old pairs sound the same though. So I don’t think burn in is required for all cables, just a few of them.

[LynnMitchell-wkpo]

A few months back I was having a lot of distortion and noise on one channel of my phono signal. After switching phono preamps, preamp and preparing to buy a new cartridge I found it was the cables. There were the original SME cables that came with the SME iii tonearm, so 35+ years old. After replacing them I took some resistance and capacitance measurements, the capacitance on one side had several micro farads of capacitance, a bit of a shock. I did check the meter against a known source to be sure. No idea how this happened

[scottyo]

In the desert sw we don't have some of the problems others do with humidity. Dust yes! There are lamps in my Moms house with the cear cords that haven't oxidized at all.

[coldfingersub]

RadioShack cheap clear vinyl coated speaker wires I purchased back in the 1980s. A whole entire roll turned green and crusty and flaky all the way through from one end to the other..
It’s broken in really well for the lovers of high impedance speaker cables.

It’s great for matching amplifiers in speakers that need a few extra ohms of resistance to get that extra rooms out of them .

They’re broken in like an age to find Don Perrion champagne. You can say they had a little extra something to the sound. 😂

I’ve been attentionally, keeping and saving the speaker cables .

For the times when somebody says wires, don’t make a difference and they want to do an A to B test

Boy, do I have I said a speaker cables you can actually hear and measure with an ohmmeter the difference .

Thank you RadioShack, for giving me such a unique, well aged, set a speaker wires that nobody else can compare to .