Neumann KH-120A, breaking in?

[Victor van DijkParticipant]

Somewhere in May 2020 (this month), I will be the proud owner of my very first pair of studio monitors, two Neumann KH-120A's 🙂
I've never had studio monitors in my life and I've read that they should be 'broken in'? What does that actually mean? Doe it mean that I will have to listen for a certain amount of time in order to familiarize myself with them? And/or does it mean, that it is (also) for TECHNICAL reasons that they should be used for a certain amount of time before they are 'ripe / mature' for monitoring?
Do Neumann monitors actually NEED to be broken in straight out of the box?

I have searched this forum and only found a 2018 question/item about Adam monitors. Does that answer hold for me as well?

Thank you for your kind answer and help!

Best,

Victor.

[face (chris) JantonParticipant]

I have had good success with letting the monitors play music for about 24 hours (un-attended) and then simply listening to everything on them to gain facility and familiarity.

I do the same listening - about a week - when I do a new setup with Sonarworks or ARC2/3 (I listen to music on my monitors almost all day long)

[Victor van DijkParticipant]

Thank you, Chris! So, 'breaking in' mainly means,  to get used to the way your monitors sound?
And a little less for pure technical reasons?

[face (chris) JantonParticipant]

That's my take on the matter. Certainly making the monitors "work" should help weed out infant mortality where things buzz or hum or just don't work.

 

[Ben TyremanParticipant]

I found that my neumann's haven't changed, they aren't like guitar amp speakers where they need to break in, I haven't noticed any changes in the sound since 2014, I think neumann put them through tests before they send them out during the quality control process so they already come 'broken in' so to speak.

p.s congratulations, they are great monitors.

• This reply was modified 3 years ago by Ben Tyreman.

[Author]

Posts