Hello,

I accidentally left my amplifier and controller (at a moderate volume) powered on for a week. I am worried whether it made any damages to the speakers (M60) or amplifier or controller. They are still working fine and audio quality is still great.

What's your thought?

Thanks in advance.

Shouldn't be an issue at all.

If there was damage to the speakers it would be audible. Same thing for the amp. If something would have went wrong with the amp like overheating it would have gone into protection mode and shut itself off. If the voice coils in the speaker cones would have burnt out, you would have been able to smell it and the speaker would be inoperable.

It doesn't sound like your equipment was left on at a dangerous enough level to induce any damage to either the speakers or the amp.

No worries mate. You could play them for a year with no ill effects.

Just like any other electronics, if you leave them on for prolonged periods of time, it is actually better for the electronics... Specifically speaking about your amp and "controller". The primary thing that causes damage to electronics, is the heat cycle, having them heat up and cool down causes thermal stresses on the solder joints, in addition to other components. Ideally you would NEVER turn your solid state electronics off.

When i was in the military, there were several solid state electronic systems that were never powered down. These systems had been running consistently since the late 90's.. As long as the electronics do not get over heated, and are able to operate within their designed specifications there will basically never be a problem.


As for your speakers... From an electrical point of view, speakers are basically just a coil of wire, and a cross over network... Since you the were playing at a moderate level, again over heating should not be an issue at all....


Long story short, don't sweat it.

My Anthem PVA5, 5 channel amplifier has been 'on' for 9 1/2 years, since early 2003.

I heard that in the 20's or 30's radio broadcasters used to turn off their tube driven amplifiers when they went off the air. They found that the heat cycling of turning the amps on and off severely degraded the life of the very expensive output tubes. Once they realized this, they left their amps on all the time.

My large 2 channel amp has a "stand by" mode. So, it is technically never turned "off". There is always some power within the amp to maintain it at a "close to operating" temperature... This reduces the degree of thermal stresses within the amp from turning it on and off... In standby mode the amp uses 60 watts of power.

Thank you all for the comments. Your comments gave me a great relief. I am happy that my M60, Outlaw 7500 and Marantz AV7005 are still in good condition.

GG, welcome. No, your speakers haven't been harmed. In fact, some audiophiles who obsess over an essentially non-existant speaker "break-in" would tell you to play them even longer than that!

My speakers, purchased in 2004, might not be broken in yet. I'm giving them a couple more years before I critically listen or decide if I should trade up!