The break-in can happen off and on over several weeks. Even low-volume break-in is useful, but playing at realistic levels is best.

How long are your speaker cables and what's your budget to step up from the RS cables?

Dave

Both speaker cables should be of equal length. This insures that the capacitance and inductance is the same, thus frequency response should be the same. Not to mention identical arrival times for the signals to each speaker. Extra wire should NEVER be wrapped up as this creates an inductance coil. Audioquest off of the spool might be good. I've liked all of their cables. Transparent HP14/4 is really good for about $2 per foot. Avoid Monster Cable 12 awg which they call OMC (Original Monster Cable.) Come to think of it avoid Monster Cable in general.

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is it true that speaker cables should be lifted up off the carpet?

You'll get different answers to that question. I haven't heard a difference, but you might. If you want to try it out, find a couple ceramic mugs and rest the cables on top. Personally, I think you'd do better investing money in good cables than you would spending it on any sort of elevation device.

Some people swear by Anti-Cables, which are $7/foot-pair. I use Linn, which costs about the same.

For cheap speaker cables, the 20g solid core (not the stranded stuff!!) radio shack hook-up wire is hard to beat. With the three-roll three color pack, at about $7, you get 25 feet of each color.

You wind or weave the three strands together (like a teenager's hair braid- but slightly more loose) and you've got an excellent budget speaker cable. That's one speaker with a 12.5ft run,as you use half the rolls for send or return. Don't bother terminating, just run the three 20g strands into the speaker terminals. You can terminate with spades if you wish. Buy another pack for the other speaker. It will blow any stranded speaker cable anywhere near that price range totally out of the water, with regards to sonic fidelity.

Make each speaker cable the same length, for both left and right speakers. There can be a sonic difference, so it's best to keep them the same length.

hey there, speaker cable man!

That's great advice.
Regarding keeping both cables the same length, I cheated slightly on advice from another experienced audiophile. He suggested that so long as the cables are NEARLY the same length, all would be well. My cables are about 10% different in length, 13.5 and 15 feet, in order to accomodate room layout.

Would you mind sharing your thoughts on the consequences of such a departure from the ideal?

The OP's cables were 40% different in length and small guage, that's asking for trouble. OTOH, any decent cables within 10% of each other are going to be hard to hear a problem, so I wouldn't worry about that.

Still, as a general rule, I'd match lengths.

Dave

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The OP's cables were 40% different in length and small guage, that's asking for trouble. OTOH, any decent cables within 10% of each other are going to be hard to hear a problem, so I wouldn't worry about that.

Still, as a general rule, I'd match lengths.

Dave

I agree. The rule tends to be to tell folks to make them the exact same length, for if you give room to cheat, then people take the next step - which is: To cheat even more.

Which then becomes a problem. Possibly.