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The Ultimate Computer Desk?
Roonster asks: "I've just moved into a new house and I am now lucky enough to have a separate room to use as a computer room/office. I have been searching for a new computer desk but most of the standard offerings seem to be lacking in imagination and design. I also tend to sit in a reclined position with my feet up on the desk beside the monitor, this eliminates a lot of the corner and U shaped designs. Have any of you come up with unique yet functional desk setups? I remember seeing some really wild (and expensive) workstations a few years ago, but have been unable to locate them recently. Any Ideas?" This topic was last discussed some 2 years ago. I figured it was time for a rehash.
is just an old deep office desk.. it fits my monitor.. speakers.. and 2 pcs on it.. well and keyboard and mouse... works ok BUT I am thinking of making/building a custom desk someday to just fit an upgrade of 3 pcs plus a couple of Uspace of rack servers. :)
OMG, the /. editors now ADMIT to reposting! WTF?
Seriously, I use a huge, heavy, solidly-built desk that is at least 20 years old. The older desks seem (in general, not in every case) to be built wway more solidly. This is important for me, cos I have a LOT of stuff on my desk (at least 60kgs all up, plus my weight when I'm killing spiders on the ceiling).
Also, the older desks weren't built with PCs in mind, yet they quite often seem to work better than new "workstation" desks and like - especially those desks with a tower holder and monitor cavity, etc. What the hell do you do with your larger-than-15-inch monitor that doesn't fit in that little hole? I find that a large, flat desk just works better for me.
And one inportant bonus is that I find you can obtain these desks rather cheaply and they last forever.
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My cheap desk is a large piece of frosted glass intended as a tabletop, supported by two tripods. I got it from IKEA. I believe the glass was $80 and the tripods $25 ea. I have a dual-head system, but they're both flat panels, so I still have lots of space.
I am on a counter, on a really tall chair, and I want a better desk... donations accepted
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I think besides functionality ergonomy is very important, because you probably sit on your desk many hours every day. If you sit with your legs on the table all the time, and your desk doesn't "support" that feature, you'll end up in a wheelchair!
http://www.anthro.com/_applications/ContentCreatio n.asp
-shoOz-
I designed my own computer desk and after using it for nearly a year now, I must say that I really like it a lot! I decided to build my own after realizing a few things...
After much searching around town I came to the realization that I wanted the look and functionality of a cheap desk but made out of hardwood like the expensive, god awful ugly unfunctional executive style desks. So from this I realized that I would have to make my own. Luckily, my grandfather is very skilled at woodworking and has made pieces of furniture before. So after talking it over with him I began making plans for a computer desk with enough room for:
I did the plans in MS Word 2000 (yea, try to keep the laughing to a minimum) in 1/12th scale (i.e. 1 inch = 1 foot). The plans show only the left side and the printer/server island. The second desk is a mirror of the left side. The plans are available here in PDF and Word 2000 versions. These plans are a little different from desk we eventually made, but the desktop area remained unchanged.
If you are truly interested in this design, I can take some photos of the finished product and provide modified plans for the version we built, along with a parts list (not to mention the "what not to do's" you only know after building one =). If you are so interested, just write a replay to this posting and I'll see what I can do. The approx cost of my desk for both sides and the server island was about $550-600 I believe (which included nearly $100 for some really nice drawer rails/slides/thingys).
Anyway this is the DIY home office solution I've came up with so I hope it either gives someone else ideas or the guts to do it themselves!
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whose desk consists of an old door on a set of old milk crates. Maybe someday i'll go for the 'real desk' but for now, it works.
This would be quite an upgrade, but I can't imagine sitting there all day like that.
I saw on techtv the other day a desk that had 2 flat panels that hung down in front of you. It wasn't even really a desk... just a really sweet looking computer chair thing. I can't find the link to it, but it was a whole system, and from what I remember it wasn't too expensive. Anyone else know what desk I'm talking about? I'll look for a link...
One thing I like is to have a lot of technical books by my machine. Because of this, the next desk I buy will have a shelf above where the monitors will go. Its otherwise wasted space anyways.
http://burk.sytes.net/modules.php?name=Content&pa= showpage&pid=1
Entertainment Hole Build a computer into here for ultimate comfort.
makes some neat looking all-in-one integrated work areas. No prices listed on their website (so I'll bet they're pretty expensive), but they do look interesting.
http://www.poetictech.com/
This desk looks very nice. I particularly like the rackmount piece, it integrates nicely.
All in all, it's a nice finish, a nice rack (mount), but not huge. This is a work desk, not a lounging desk.
Still, it's given me ideas, perhaps it'll help you too.
(Yes, it's off the Penny Arcade domain. No, the link isn't to a comic strip.)
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or if you have no mechanical abilities, and thats fine, you can go to IKEA and buy kits at a reasonable cost. plus theyll look good.
I want 2D games back.
it's in the latest wired.
only $7K!
http://www.mypce.com/products.html
A Poetic Desk!
PoeticTech Desks
All others pale by comparison and the amount of comfort and human convenience is mind-boggling. There's even room to put in tiny little fridges!
There is nothing better (that I've seen) than what these guys can do for you. A computer desk with air conditioning; a power swivel--for the whole desk just to track the sun (no sun-glare for you); specially-designed ambient lighting; ultimately adjustable seats! What more need be said? This Ask Slashdot is answered.
I got a nice L-desk that can be found here It doesn't have a ton of cabinets, but it was cheap and hold my stuff.
Get a bunch of cinder blocks and plywood. And maybe some 2 by 4s nailed onto the back of the plywood where you need extra strength (if you have a large span under yer monitor). Re-arrange until happy. Just be careful not to drop a block on your foot :D
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This post has some nice pics of computer desks
While I use a pre-fab desk from office max, because it has a nice cd rack on the left side. But my friend uses quite a cheap effective home-made desk. It consists of two two-drawer filing cabinets with a standard sized door across the top of both of them. Big, flat. You can add more cabinets and doors/wood planks of various sizes to create any arrangement you want.
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Go to Ikea and look for the "Jerker" desk. Terrible name for a product in an English speaking country, but it's a great desk with lots of room. The have shelves, keyboard trays, cable organizers, and CPU holders (which are good for holding USB/1394 devices in a stack or your PDA/camera/cell phone stuff). They also have a rack of lights your can bolt under the top shelf for built-in lighting. You can also adjust the height of the tabletop, but you have to take the desk apart to do it.
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I use Grandpa's old desk. BIG oak thing. I figure it's at least 60 years old. My parents had it restored back in the 70s, it's still in pretty decent shape despite lots of moving while my dad was in the Army.
Wide drawer in the center for pencils and desk supplies, drawers down both sides -- bottom right is double height for file folders. On either side of the chair, there are pull out boards for writing or holding papers -- but I use em for resting my elbows on while I'm typing.
I've never measured it, but it must be over a yard deep. With the keyboard in front of me and a few inches of open space, my 21" monitor doesn't hang off the back of it. Plenty of room on either side for a stack of books, a picture, phone, and speakers.
Only downside is the sheer size of this thing. Barely fit though my doors moving in, and it's heavy! Any future apartments will have to be on the first floor -- not sure I could convince friends to help me move it up a flight of stairs!
This seems like it'd be the perfect desk for kicking your legs up on and leaning back, but I just sit kinda normal like in my chair.
http://www.metro.com/index.cfm
I'm a fan of this system. They have a few competetors with similar specs.
Since they have many odd parts, you can easily make exactly what you want.
Wire rack makes it simple to velcro or zip tie cables, and attach things to an overhead shelf like speakers and lights
Quote 1:
Bart: According to three-time soap box derby champion Ronny Beck, "Poorly guarded contruction sites are a gold mine."
Quote 2:
Marge: Homer, we have a perfectly good bookcase.
Homer: Yeah, but this is what they're doing on campus. Besides, it isn't costing us: I swiped the cinderblocks from a construction site.
[At the site, a worker walks forlornly up to his boss]
Worker: Sir, six cinderblocks are missing.
Boss: There'll be no hospital, then. I'll tell the children.
~Philly
View the JPGs here.
"1984" was ment to be a warning, not a guidebook. You hear that Kim Jong-il!? BushCo?!
If you like to recline, how about a wireless keyboard & mouse with a hospital table holding the monitor so that it can be close enough.
Ikea makes this small computer unit that can sit by the side of your chair.
I worked at Borland years ago and someone at the time used a lazyboy and a hospital table so that the monitor was positioned just right.
In my house, since I have many monitors, I bought a door from home depot, and put milk crates on either side. I might look sort of ghetto, but I have a LOT of room!
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If you buy a desk you'll be paying a big premium for the conveineince, especially on the more simple designs.
If you have the tools, then building your own really isn't all that hard. A 10'x8', 3/4" MDF sheet is about 11 quid ($15) and should be adequate to build a desk to hold multiple machines.
You can use batons to wall mount it, backed up with tubular steel legs (again, fairly cheap) and since you're doing it yourself you can shape it precisely and plan where you're going to put holes, mount points, power points etc.
If I was bulding one, I'd set ethernet ports into the top, or build a vertical section to mount them to. Same with power points - get wall mounting sockets and fit them into the desk and have a single plug coming out near the bottom of the desk to plug it into the wall, making cabling much simpler.
Mounting rack-designed units would be pretty easy too. Stuff like ethernet switches and the like could be mounted vertically in the desk top off to one side, and if you had heavier stuff it wouldn't be hard to build a rack unit into the design in place of one of the legs - a 12U rack would be slightly too small for desk height, but modifying it to enable you to fit a desktop above it would be easy.
Plus, building stuff is fun!
I have a desk which is just some of that stuff that is used as kitchen worktops with my main machine a c64, acorn a3000, gamecube and a few other consoles in seperate little pullout draws
now where did i put that micro
Thinkin of putting a kitchen sink in
A company called Ultimate makes keyboard stands and `studio equipment stations' that are quite popular in the music world. After poking at some of these in my local Mars Music, I decided that they were almost what I wanted, and then found the `ThinkerToys' stuff -- basically, Ultimate sells the individual pieces used to construct these stands, so you can design your own. Mine is a 3-tier, sitting next to a 6' wire rack shelf. I made the `desktop' myself, from thin pressed wood (Mmmmm, luan...) sheathed in corrugated plastic (available at any decent art supply store). The displays sit on a row slightly above this one, and there's a utility shelf above them. There's also a side-shelf mounted on the right support, slightly above the kayboard, that holds my laptop when I want it and swings out of the way the rest of the time. The wire rack shelf holds the CPUs, printer, scanner, and other junk.
My setup was a little pricey (about $400 total, I believe), and took a while to get `just right', but I enjoyed putting it together, and I'm pretty happy with it.
I've got an Ikea Amon/Curry desk. Nice size, looks good, was cheap etc. Only problem is, after 2.5 years of supporting a 19" monitor off centre, its got a curve to it, so my keyboard rocks. Damn annoying! Be alert!
One of the few places I've seen that carries a wide range of ergonomic furniture, including sit-to-stand desks, is OfficeOrganix. I have my eye on them for outfitting my office at work.
In addition to more or less traditional desks and chairs, they have some crazy stuff, such as the Stance chair, which adjusts from a kneeler chair to a regular chair to a lean-back-while-standing chair; and a couple of reclining desks or desk/chair combinations.
Even if you want to build your own, their site may be worth looking at for ideas. Their prices also approach reasonable, which is a rarity in the ergonomic furniture arena (where, I suppose, the assumption is that insurance or lawsuit money is paying for everything).
Poetic Tech
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While not the most attractive things in the world, a big (eg: they come anywhere from 6-12' long, I like the 8 footers) works well. Make sure you don't get a cheap one though, as they don't handle weight all that well. You can probably get an older one (read: sturdier/metal, no plastic crap) one from a garage, rumage, bizzarre sale.
You can easily do Dual-head, multiple machines, multiple people, plus it is fairly portable!
-OctaneZ
years ago i needed a desk for my first computer and swiped the old kitchen table from my parents attic. it is big, heavy, deep and ugly, but i have it and my 21"crt up against the wall, and there is a full magazine-height of room between my belly and keyboard. conference tables are a good solution i saw someone mention, but it would be nice to screw and/or glue a 2 x 4 tallways underneath to add some stiffness. otherwise they inevetably sag in a year or two. but they are cheap. the more specialized 'computer' desks i've seen pigeonhole (literally!) you into having a 15" monitor, pc minitower, and big ugly beige keyboard. nothing else quite fits.
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What I did to maximize space.. let's see.. two monitors, a 15" flat panel, an apple cinema display, a notebook, three towers, and room left over. What you want is table surface and LOTS OF IT.
All you need is a few sheets of 3/4" plywood, a way to cut it, a drill and some screws, and some industrial table legs. You can finish it however you want, I didn't bother. I just sanded it down. I might get fancy and laminate it or whatever, but that strikes me as one more thing to cause a problem.
I looked at the room I had - about 10' x 4' on one side of the L in the corner, 5' x 4' on the other side of the L. I cut out the plywood to match the shape I wanted. Then I doubled it up by screwing the two sheets of 3/4" plywood together into a good, very, very solid 1.5" sheet. A few minutes with a sander will take off the rough edges. Then just screw/clamp on the table legs you bought, or pile up some cinderblocks. I recommend the legs, though. When you move, just throw away the plywood and keep the legs. Plywood is very cheap here, no more than $100 or so for two very large sheets.
This allows you a solid surface to bolt things to without worries you're destroying an expensive desk. I'm waiting to get one of those floating arms to put a 15" LCD panel on to move around to whatever machine needs more screen space.
The lack of drawers lets you put machines and cables underneath at will without problems. You can stretch your legs out and not worry about smashing your knees. I store my extra stuff in large plastic toolboxes that cost me about $10 and are really handy for hauling stuff around in. The cheap metal storage shelves you find (or slightly more expensive wooden ones) are all you need for books and whatnot.
If you don't have access to woodworking tools, then do what I did when I had my apartment - go to Sears et. al and get the biggest, cheapest, thickest kitchen table you can find. Use that for your desk. It's all about massive surface area. It's also a lot cheaper than a useless "Executive" style desk with no room for monitors.
Hope that helps. Works for me. Doesn't look real good, but it is very functional.
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It's got a long board about 6 inches above the main desk surface, with a supporting board, between the two. It's wide enough for 3 monitors side by side (2 for my main box's ti4200 dual head, another for whatever other little box I have hooked up) If you make one (which I think would be a good idea, with your requests), try to do a similar thing. It's a computer desk, but it does not sacrifice working area. It's about twice as wide as the area for your legs, so I've got the other area filled with an industrial ethernet chassis (Cabletron MMAC-M8FNB) and two skinny-ish desktop cases (old vectra's). There's plenty of room on it, especially with the tower stand off to the left of it. If you can picture what i'm saying, try making it. I like mine a lot.
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I remember seeing a desk that held the computer components in itself, with a glass window over the top where you could look down on the motherboard. This was on slashdot about 1-2 years ago, I haven't been able to find it since then, anyone know what im talking about? Where can I find this desk again?
Laugh all damn day, but I built a loft when I was in college that beats the shit out of any other computer desk, anywhere.
1' under the bed area (now used for plain-old storage space), there's a recessed shelf that's deep enough for my array of home theater components, all arranged on a 6' long power strip.
2.5' below that is a desk that's wide enough for a set of large (shielded) bookshelf speakers, a 21" and a 17" monitor.
The area beneath the desk is high enough to accomodate the tallest tower cases I could find.
The sides are cross-braced, and the desk and shelf are supported on the braces. The "back" braces have their own, small shelf for rear-surround bookshelf speakers, right at ear-level.
The whole set up inspired geek awe when I was in college, and I've never found anything so functional anyplace else, so I continue to use it as a grown-up, even though I can afford real furniture.
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We each have main computer tables: 36"x78". 3 feet gives a nice deep amount of space. They're 30" high, with knee/thigh clearance of 26". They have a couple of thin, deep drawers. There are 2-3 machines lurking under each table. Something I will soon add to the setup is a sort of bookshelf underneath (out of kicking range) for external firewire drives, the hub, the hardware firewall, etc.
I have another table, meant for one monitor, that's 36"x48", with one deep drawer.
All of these were built by English Country Pine, in San Rafael, CA. Since they're basically big rectangles that will last forever, they may see future use in a dining room, or, they would be straightforward to sell. I like them because they have acres of desktop space.
I've had the same problem, then one day at Office Depot/Max (doesn't really matter) I found the desk that was perfect for me. Remember the episode of The Jetsons where George is playing the drums at the concert? Since then I wanted a desk that surrounded me and I've come close to my greatest desk yet. I love desk usage area space, so I can use it as a work table and layout all of my documents and stuff I do, non-computer related. My desk comes with a shelving area on one side and some slots for CDs and stuff on one end and a small cabinet on the other end. I put my dual monitors in the middle of the U with my PC case to my left and other gizmos to my upper left corner next to a monitor. Now I have all the area to the right of me and to the left and rear left of me for work space. I use the area to the left and rear left for paper work area (mail, bills, documents, stuff that's important at the moment) and my right area, I try to keep clear at all times. I have an artist lamp on both either ends of my desk, which is great when I'm working my fixing or messing with my computer or working with some gizmos. I LOVE DESK SPACE! I also have my desk with the open U facing the wall, so the wall is behind me. Behind me I have a whiteboard and my speakers so I have complete surround sound. Also, I have privacy with the monitors and door in front of me. My bookcase is to the right of my desk and I set my TV to the front left of me. I like it.