We went out to Ikea today to find a new TV stand. Here at our rental, there's a big alcove above the fireplace, but in Cleveland it will have to sit on top of something. I still have the one I bought at Target about five years ago, along with a matching rack, but we decided to retire them. The rack is largely useless at this point, because no one really has a rack of equipment anymore, just a stereo receiver and a cable box. The goal was to obtain a single unit.
For some reason, "real" furniture stores never carry this stuff, or what they have is inadequate. For example, they make stuff that isn't deep enough. That's why I ended up buying stuff from Target. This time we figured we'd give Ikea a try, while we have access to one.
I found something that had potential before hand online, but once we got there, we immediately found something new that looked better and was more functional. It had plenty of room for stuff with glass doors to keep little fingers off. It needs holes for ventilation and cables, but it'll definitely work.
It was a custom "build" of sorts. There's a basic shelving unit with doors, drawers and hardware. The problem is, the parts list didn't make it clear what was in the boxes. A dude in the store suggested the hardware was included, then he didn't after we popped a box. I ended up sprinting back through the store to ID the unit we saw, then find the parts.
The process added a half-hour due to their vague and incomplete parts list. It very nearly started to irritate me enough to bail and say screw it. I was hungry, Simon was crabby, it was not a good scene. The general uncertainty also mandated that I had to build the thing now, instead of just taking the packed components to Cleveland, because I wasn't going to wait a month and 2,500 miles to find something was missing.
Ikea is so hit or miss like this. If you're just buying simple stuff like some plates or a lamp, you're good. Assembled furniture gets more and more risky when there are more parts. Happy with what we got though. It should really simplify the electronic crap without it being the dominant feature of the room. The redecorating begins.
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