GIK?

TheOctopus

TheOctopus

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Apr 4, 2013
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While I have direct experience with ASC products and have used them in the past, I have never tried GIK. How are effective are GIK products for the money?

Thanks.
 
Well personally if you have had ASC experience I'd maybe stick with the devil you know.

I've owned Tube Traps since 1990 and have not found anything that would make me change--Art is super helpful they have good deals on the items

and best of all they work as described. I'm sure GIK and others are creditable performers--it's just I like Arts explanation of his features and workings simple and effective.

They work for me.

YVMV

BruceD
 
I have GIK traps and feel like they are very effective and affordable also. They are helpful if you talk to then over the phone as well.

George
 
I enjoyed the experience. They (Alex) helped me pick some products based on an REW recording in my room. Reasonably priced products, with many exterior colors available. Excellent result.
 
Bones13 said:
I enjoyed the experience. They (Alex) helped me pick some products based on an REW recording in my room. Reasonably priced products, with many exterior colors available. Excellent result.
Click to expand...

If I understand correctly, you used REW to check/plot your room response, found the deficiencies, added room treatments based on that, and then measured again to make sure the problem was corrected. Is that right?
That approach sounds logical to me and would be much better than just trying to do the adjustments by ear.
 
Correct. I could not correct all the 40hz bump I have in my small, rectangular room, but the rest is pretty smooth. Taming the very low frequencies requires using several (many?) of their specially tuned traps. The 40hz ones are 2x2 foot, about 1 foot deep. Those would take up a significant amount of my 9.5x14 room.
 
TheOctopus said:
While I have direct experience with ASC products and have used them in the past, I have never tried GIK. How are effective are GIK products for the money?

Thanks.
Click to expand...

They're great. Adding these to my system in 2019 brought some of the biggest improvements I've made to the system. Excellent value for money and they work really really well. For your smaller room, I'd really recommend 4-6 of the GIK Alpha 4A panels, placed along the front walls and at your 1st reflection points. These function both as "mathematical" diffusors and bass traps. I've got six of them in my listening space, 4 along the front wall and corners, and 1 at the 1st reflection points. I've also got one Polyfusor Sound Diffuser in one corner of the back wall. I tried two but it was too much damping in my space.

Right and left sides of the front wall shown, respectively. GIK has become my go-to company for acoustical panels.
4A%20Panel%20Corners-2.jpg


4A%20Panel%20Corners-1.jpg


Behind the 'Beths.
Scharf%20Stereo-1.jpg


At first reflection point along left wall.
Scharf%20Stereo-6.jpg
 
Bones13 said:
Correct. I could not correct all the 40hz bump I have in my small, rectangular room, but the rest is pretty smooth. Taming the very low frequencies requires using several (many?) of their specially tuned traps. The 40hz ones are 2x2 foot, about 1 foot deep. Those would take up a significant amount of my 9.5x14 room.
Click to expand...

Thanks! When you have done what you can with room treatments (keeping in mind that the limitations can also be due to aesthetic reasons), you can use active room correction to fine tune your set up. Room treatments plus room and modern correction algorithms can do wonders for rooms of any size.
 
I might, one day, make a file to use in Roon, for room correction. Probably won’t use a formal AD - DA type active room correction unit. Just a choice, as I would not want to run my vinyl through one.
 
I had good luck with GIK. In 2010, I purchased multiple panels. GIK's advice was helpful, sound in my room improved and the price seemed reasonable. For one of the panels, I sent artwork. The printed face looked good and I was very satisfied.

For 2021, I'm finishing new home construction with a new dedicated stereo room. I contacted GIK. Again, they were were helpful and when I finish construction, I plan on ordering more GIK products.
 
I use two Softfit bass traps with scatter plates and 2 2*4 4A Alpha Pro Series Bass Trap Diffusor / Absorber. I think the GIK products work great. I also have 2 other brands of acoustic products as well.
 
I have a substantial amount of GIK panels (absorption and diffusion) in my multi-purpose listening room/home theater. Half of my 16x29 room is for 2 channel listening and the rear half of the room is a home theater system. I have a total of 13 absorption panels (from 7" Monster bass traps to 4" full range absorption panels) and 8 diffusion panels which are all in the 2 channel listening side of the room. To some degree it is overkill on the Impression diffusion panels because I was working on a visual centerpiece for the system with the panels. But the combination balances out.

My experience with GIK over the past couple of years has been they may be the best value source around for quality panels, clearly they have built a large platform for themselves with their customer service, training videos and discussion communities. I cannot fault them in any of these areas. They have a huge variety of products with a lot of customization, premium fabrics, and art panels, etc. The build quality has traditionally been solid if a little basic. Most importantly I have experienced excellent results both from working with their advisors and the actual panels in my room.

For the not-so-great, I think they have experienced severe growing pains since COVID and have had order fulfillment times extending 2-3 months. This was last summer when I ordered, in the fall when I ordered, and in December when I ordered again, each time at least 8-10 weeks for fulfillment. Comparing this to 2019 when I ordered and got my panels in 2-3 weeks. Chalk this up to all the people staying at home for the past year and deciding they want to experiment with acoustic panels. I think also their QC has suffered just a bit during the COVID crunch. My recent orders have had lots of splinters, some of the fabric is creased and wrinkled on the front of the panels, etc. Compared to the panels I bought in 2019 I experienced nothing like that.

I'm sure they will get back on track once things settle down from COVID - I don't know what kind of workplace issues they have run into but obviously demand and shortage of labor has been an issue for them. Just some things to consider if you're planning on ordering anytime soon.
 
JSQT said:
I have a substantial amount of GIK panels (absorption and diffusion) in my multi-purpose listening room/home theater. Half of my 16x29 room is for 2 channel listening and the rear half of the room is a home theater system. I have a total of 13 absorption panels (from 7" Monster bass traps to 4" full range absorption panels) and 8 diffusion panels which are all in the 2 channel listening side of the room. To some degree it is overkill on the Impression diffusion panels because I was working on a visual centerpiece for the system with the panels. But the combination balances out.

My experience with GIK over the past couple of years has been they may be the best value source around for quality panels, clearly they have built a large platform for themselves with their customer service, training videos and discussion communities. I cannot fault them in any of these areas. They have a huge variety of products with a lot of customization, premium fabrics, and art panels, etc. The build quality has traditionally been solid if a little basic. Most importantly I have experienced excellent results both from working with their advisors and the actual panels in my room.

For the not-so-great, I think they have experienced severe growing pains since COVID and have had order fulfillment times extending 2-3 months. This was last summer when I ordered, in the fall when I ordered, and in December when I ordered again, each time at least 8-10 weeks for fulfillment. Comparing this to 2019 when I ordered and got my panels in 2-3 weeks. Chalk this up to all the people staying at home for the past year and deciding they want to experiment with acoustic panels. I think also their QC has suffered just a bit during the COVID crunch. My recent orders have had lots of splinters, some of the fabric is creased and wrinkled on the front of the panels, etc. Compared to the panels I bought in 2019 I experienced nothing like that.

I'm sure they will get back on track once things settle down from COVID - I don't know what kind of workplace issues they have run into but obviously demand and shortage of labor has been an issue for them. Just some things to consider if you're planning on ordering anytime soon.
Click to expand...

GIK is not the only company that is experiencing more orders than they than quickly fulfill. I did an interview with Roy Gandy of Rega for my review in TAS the week before last, and he says that even with 140 employees, they cannot manufacture product quickly enough to meet demand.
 
Puma Cat said:
GIK is not the only company that is experiencing more orders than they than quickly fulfill. I did an interview with Roy Gandy of Rega for my review in TAS the week before last, and he says that even with 140 employees, they cannot manufacture product quickly enough to meet demand.
Click to expand...

This is a global problem which extends far beyond audio to appliances, cars and much more. It’s quite frankly, a global supply chain issue.

For audio related, we could sell 20 times more if we could just get inventory. Companies like Lumin should be commended for being able to meet demand measured in days, not months.

Many companies are 3-6 months waiting time. Some discontinue entire series of products and then “whoops”, we won’t have the new series until July. Most just can’t meet demand or have they themselves severe raw material shortages. Our September Luxman order just arrived. HA!

NAIM cannot get us a single digital piece for 12 months. The factory in Japan that makes their chips burned down!!

Combine this with price increases from Harbeth, Boulder, Shunyata, Magico, etc.

Hey, at least MSB decreased prices!

Fun times for sure.



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro
 
Mike said:
This is a global problem which extends far beyond audio to appliances, cars and much more. It’s quite frankly, a global supply chain issue.

For audio related, we could sell 20 times more if we could just get inventory. Companies like Lumin should be commended for being able to meet demand measured in days, not months.

Many companies are 3-6 months waiting time. Some discontinue entire series of products and then “whoops”, we won’t have the new series until July. Most just can’t meet demand or have they themselves severe raw material shortages. Our September Luxman order just arrived. HA!

NAIM cannot get us a single digital piece for 12 months. The factory in Japan that makes their chips burned down!!

Combine this with price increases from Harbeth, Boulder, Shunyata, Magico, etc.

Hey, at least MSB decreased prices!

Fun times for sure.



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro
Click to expand...

Exactly.

Consumer Demand Snaps Back. Factories Can’t Keep Up. - WSJ
 
Geez Mike that is crazy. I know I have heard a lot of people in the Naim forums complain about availability (and most of those guys are in the UK), but I had no idea it was that bad. I am glad I have my NDX2!
 
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