Does software need a break-in period?

Does a freshly installed music player sound the same as after a some time of use? Is the quality of the power supply extra critical during such a break-in period? If music files can be permanently contaminated by electrical noise during processing, then presumably the same applies to software as well.

You are now officially as bad as I am.

Next up: What compiler optimization settings sound the best? (Damien actually had people vote on whether clang or gcc sounded better. I never knew if he was being serious.)

Man, this rabbit hole goes SO DEEP.

Does a freshly installed music player sound the same as after a some time of use? Is the quality of the power supply extra critical during such a break-in period? If music files can be permanently contaminated by electrical noise during processing, then presumably the same applies to software as well.

Yeah you're definitely kidding us!!!

I'm really hoping that this is a joke.

Why is it any more unlikely than audible differences in audio files with identical check-sums?

The answer is yes for Windows, Mac and Linux. Android playback doesn't suffer from these issues.

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Does software need a break-in period?

You are now officially as bad as I am.

 

Next up: What compiler optimization settings sound the best? (Damien actually had people vote on whether clang or gcc sounded better. I never knew if he was being serious.)

I would imagine he was serious. There are performance differences between binaries built with different compilers for other purposes (see top answer here: compiler construction - iPhone GCC / LLVM GCC or LLVM? - Stack Overflow), so why not for music playback purposes?

As for the original topic, heh.

(Snort!) Unfair to post stuff like this when innocent unaware readers might be drinking a cup of coffee...

-Waggravate-return

-Wcast-spell

-Wcaste-align

-Win

-Wmissing-protons

-Wredundant-repetitions

-antsy

-fbungee-jump

-fexpensive-operations

-fextra-strength

-fjesus-saves

-fkeep-programmers-inline

-fno-peeping-toms

-fruit-roll-ups

-fshort-enough

-mno-dialogue

-pedophile

-vomit-frame-pointer

A+ beta with DSD was sounding awesome first night for me and not much so after several days. Is this what we speak about?

A+ beta with DSD was sounding awesome first night for me and not much so after several days. Is this what we speak about?

Yes. The problem is particularly acute with DSD software. With DSD we have a single stream of a single bit doing all the work. With PCM it is divided between multiple bits grouped in pulses of discrete samples. So DSD wears away the proper edges in the signal. With time it leads to a smoothed over sound that many actually like though it is really not highest fidelity. Think of it being similar to grooves on an LP being worn smooth with repeated playing. There's a reason many refer to DSD being more analog like than PCM.

Does turning my computer off eliminate all the benefits of software break-in?

Does data also get broken in or just degrade from the RF/EMI in the computer?

No, but simulated annealing inside an FPGA needs to be addressed during code compilation. The voicing process at PS Audio for new DirectStream OS' involves listening to 20 different compiles from the same code base.

Why is it any more unlikely than audible differences in audio files with identical check-sums?

Godwin's law of CA fulfilled.

same here

A+ beta with DSD was sounding awesome first night for me and not much so after several days. Is this what we speak about?

OK new product category : Break-in software that will break in your software for you..

Does turning my computer off eliminate all the benefits of software break-in?

 

Does data also get broken in or just degrade from the RF/EMI in the computer?

I have on good authority from an expert in the field, that the wideband RF buildup in data levels off and gets no worse at a certain point. I don't have all the info to say as regards the software itself. My guess being software's more complex nature is harder to predict than the data files used by the software.

You are now officially as bad as I am.

 

Next up: What compiler optimization settings sound the best? (Damien actually had people vote on whether clang or gcc sounded better. I never knew if he was being serious.)

Actually this could definitely matter. I have seen cases where different compiler options (not to mention different compilers) made code run slightly faster.

Does a freshly installed music player sound the same as after a some time of use? Is the quality of the power supply extra critical during such a break-in period? If music files can be permanently contaminated by electrical noise during processing, then presumably the same applies to software as well.

Does a download sound different depending on the hops from the download server?

Does turning my computer off eliminate all the benefits of software break-in?

It does. Noise floor goes to zero. Of course there's no music playing...

Sorry I could not help myself...

OK new product category : Break-in software that will break in your software for you..

Can you use it recursively? How many recursions for conversion?

Actually this could definitely matter. I have seen cases where different compiler options (not to mention different compilers) made code run slightly faster.

I've seen cases where over-zeolous optimization, especially of fortran, can result in binaries that give the wrong results for calculations.

A+ beta with DSD was sounding awesome first night for me and not much so after several days. Is this what we speak about?

This is the same listening experience when upgrading another audio component. There is a change, it may not be obvious right away but give a few days of listening, then judge. I find if there's no obvious preference for the new sound, then revert to the original and start again.

Sometimes the change is obnoxious, like many members posts, so that change is an easy choice to revert and quickly.