IKEA Aptitlig: A juicy cheap upgrade.

Yep, It's a cutboard. Plain and simple. The following refers to my humble experience.


I've always indulged on the objective side of the Audiophile hobby, but with time I learned that a\bing on an unresolving rig and finding no differences told only a little part of the story. Ditto for all the rest of my certainty. Bits are bits, all cables are the same, Ancillary items don't matter, CD is technically superior to Vinyl so it must sound better.
I dropped those certainties in favour of the benefit of the doubt for matters that are not unanimously defined in the hobby (i.e. everything). Ok... I got it. I've got only few message posted on this board and yet I come up with a thread on a highly subjective (and possibly unmeasureble) piece of gear. Please try not to kill me.

Long story short:

Weeks ago a friend of mine came to see me at my place and brought a little chinese dac. He brought also a little piece of wood. He said he read online that it was a good place to lay your gears on and that would also bring some improvements. We laid the dac on the cutboard and listened. After we tried without. I couldn't hear a difference.
Then I tried to put it under my amplifier... This time I thought I could hear something different. The bass was more focused and mids and highs kinda sounded more natural.
In the days following I went to IKEA and bought a couple of cutboard and tried them under my gears (TT, phono amp, int amp, audio pc and speakers) Under the speakers was the most astonishing scenario. The bass was even deeper with no trace of bloating. Everything had more focus. I read some online articles and found out the the best thing was direct coupling the case to the board with little pieces of wood cut from a thinner board. I can't remove my amp feet so I tried with 3 little pieces. Even better.
I ended up buyng 7 cutboards and put everything over a board. Even in my second system with bookshelf speaker I found it beneficial. In Italy they cost 15,99 Euro. I won't go bankrupt, rest assured.

I don't know how to explain this... They say that since you cannot effectively isolate your electronics from vibrations you'd better route them out properly with the right material, wich is wood or, more specifically for the IKEA cutboards, bamboo. I tried also with other Ikea non bamboo boards and there was no improvement.

Here are a few links:
http://www.theaudiobeat.com/blog/ikea_aptitlig.htm
http://tweekgeek.blogspot.it/2015/06/further-discoveries-on-ikea-aptitlig.html
http://www.computeraudiophile.com/f...board-and-herbies-audio-lab-tenderfeet-23203/

There's also the rip off option for elitists who are afraid of spending so little money
http://6moons.com/audioreviews/levelaudio/1.html

Well... this is my experience. I'd like to know if anybody else tried this with similar effect in a hedphone rig. If you haven't, try it and let me know your findings.
Don't let yourself be discouraged by the fact that John Darko use them regularly.

 

Something similar to this was recommended to me to put under my turn table by @shaizada . A 2" thick Mapleshade platform. I can see why this might work well for a turntable. I am more skeptical with dacs and amps, but I assume it's the same argument as to why audio racks can improve sound.

And as you stated, its a small investment. Worst case scenario you are going to be very prepared for a wine and cheese party

 

You can be damn sure I'm ready for a wine and cheese party
Trust me it's not only for TT... the biggest improvement was putting them under the speaker. I previously used metal spikes or rubber footers and I'm never coming back to them.
I also tried under some dacs... for small portable ones it didn't make much of a difference but for full sized dac (e.g. a counterpoint DA-10) it was a definitevely perceivable difference. Tubes also benefits a lot from bamboo boards.

 

Not try to distinguish your system in a double blind test where you can't see which one is on the boards.

 

I put the Ikea bamboo butcher board (the thick one) under my amp. I'm not sure it made a difference to the SQ but it makes it a lot easier to slide that heavy sucker in and out if I need to get to the rear panel

 

I'll be more than glad to do that but it's not easy as switching cables or dacs. Putting my speaker (25 kg at leat) on the board or my amp is not something I can ask my fiancée to do. Plus it requires time. I did switch back and forth by myself with long listening session and I can say that I definitevely prefer boards under components. Maybe when my audio buddies and I will meet again this is something we can try.

Apart from that... doing the same experiment wil not cost you much. Worst case scenario you will buy a kick-ass cutboard to serve starters and I'm just allucinating

 

I figured it out - Vastx is an ikea salesman who needs to reach his quote of cutting boards!

I can also see the argument for the speaker where mechanical vibration is directly related to the output of the speaker. I know it is widely accepted that spiked feet improve sound by limiting the normal forces acted upon the floor. I have heard the arguments of fancy audio racks isolating components and improving sound, but have not experienced it first hand. Do you have any type of cork / rubber / speaker spikes or feet under the cutting boards?

I am not trying to knock the improvements you hear, I am simply the devils advocate that has to question everything and look for scientific reasoning.

Again, buying some inexpensive cutting boards is way different than expensive magic cables or audio enhancing prisms and rocks. I think it is a good performance / cost risk to explore.

 

@ctrlm
You have to direct couple the case to the board via a piece of the thinner bamboo cutboard.
Like This:

 

Worst case scenario - the men in white coats pay you an unexpected visit, and give you a new place to stay.

 

@JoshMorr
Crap, You got me... I work for IKEA

I used to put spikes, cork, rubber and even granite. Let's just say I took almost every piece of advise I was given by friends or I read. I've only used poor man's materials and I've never bought any fancy footer though I've had some of the fancy stuff on loan for a period.
Well.. The board in my setup made the difference, the aforementioned materials were always resulting in an "I'm not sure I hear anything different" attitude. Nonetheless I tried those materials under the board and the results were not happy. This is true for my experience with electronics.

Talking about speakers... The sound changes with everything I put under them. Spikes makes the thinnest and lean sound; It gets darker with rubber and almost bass bloating with several layers o foam, rubber and other soft material.

 

@lm4der
Nice one

I assume you tried and couldn't tell any difference, right?

 

I am indeed guilty of being a naysayer without having tried it. That said, there are lots of things I haven't tried that don't deserve it - homeopathy is a good example. I've also heard that throwing salt over your shoulder when you sneeze (or something like that) does good things. I think the idea that a bamboo block under your solid state component (amp, dac, power conditioner), sounds better than with another type of block, or no block, sticks out as an extraordinary claim. Extraordinary claims need extraordinary evidence.

I love that the picture (in your middle link above) has a big purple crystal perched on the top of the stack.



Here's that link pasted from above:
http://tweekgeek.blogspot.it/2015/06/further-discoveries-on-ikea-aptitlig.html

 

Decoupling the speaker from the floor will of course change the sound. Everything else, I dunno.

 

Look mate... really... I don't make such extraordinary claims. If I were you I would have written just the same as you did. I f'ing hate snake oil audiophile crazyness. Trust me... I don't have expensive crystal minerals on my stack. I don't use homeopathy, nor do I throw salt over my shoulder.
A friend brought this shit into my house. I got curious. I tried. Other people did too and it's all over the internet. I'm not trying to sell you anything nor am I working for ikea audiophile marketing division

I won't tell you that you can't provide any proof that these boards are useless either. That would take us in a vicious circle. I'm not able to provide extraordibay evidence, I said in the first post I really can't understand how or why this works for electronic gear. I could have written that I A\Bed and got a perfect score. I didn't. It's hard for me A\Bing this boards. If I got you curious try it and then thank me or send me to get laid My hope is that you do that after trying.

 

Fair enough and good answer. I can't discount your experience. And A/B'ing _is_ notoriously difficult.

 

How 'cheap' are we talking about?

I may get one for cutting vegetables.

 

I'm going to get one, have my girlfriend spank me with it, and see whether my hearing improves.

 

If only more people would think like this.

 

This cheap....
The main board: 14,99 usd
http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/00233429/
The board you should cut to make little footers: 7,99 usd
http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/80233430/

I appreciate

 

Click on pic to enlarge

I have been using these boards for about a year or so, I like them. I have not gone so far as to create a rack out of them, but did do coupling experiments with different wood blocks under the chassis to couple to the bamboo. I did not like. I have found the right material couplers from my "drawer of tweaks" that work for me.